A blues legend's pact with darkness, reimagined as a ghostly, devastating confession by an Austrian artist who makes it feel timeless
Robert Johnson's "Me and the Devil Blues" is one of the most mythologised songs in American music. Written in 1938 by a Mississippi bluesman who legend says sold his soul to the devil at a crossroads in exchange for musical genius, the original is a raw, defiant confession: the devil knocked on my door this morning, and I let him in. We walked together. And when I die, bury my body by the highway so my spirit can catch a bus and ride.
Soap&Skin — Austrian artist Anja Plaschg — takes this 85-year-old blues skeleton and rebuilds it into something entirely different. Her version is slower, sparser, and more terrifying. Where Johnson's original has the swagger of someone who's made peace with damnation, Plaschg's version sounds like someone who hasn't made peace with anything. Her voice cracks and trembles, barely holding itself together. The piano is minimal, almost reluctant. The spaces between the notes are as powerful as the notes themselves.
The devil in this song works on multiple levels. Literally, it's the Christian figure of Satan — the embodiment of evil and temptation. But figuratively, the devil is whatever dark force lives inside you: addiction, self-destruction, depression, the part of yourself that pulls you toward harm. Walking "side by side" with the devil means living alongside your demons, neither conquering them nor being conquered. Just walking. Just coexisting.
The song gained a massive second life through Netflix's Dark, where its haunting atmosphere perfectly matched the show's themes of fate, duality, and the coexistence of good and evil within every person. It later went viral on TikTok, proving that a 1938 blues song, filtered through a 2013 Austrian reinterpretation, could still pierce through the noise of the internet and hit people in the chest.
What it means: The devil arrives at dawn — uninvited but not unexpected. The narrator opens the door, acknowledging what's come for him.
Why it matters: It's domestic and casual. The devil doesn't crash through the wall. He knocks. And the narrator answers. That everyday quality makes the darkness feel more real, not less.
What it means: The narrator and the devil are companions — not enemies, not master and servant, but equals walking together.
Why it matters: "Side by side" implies partnership, not submission. The narrator isn't being dragged to hell. He's walking there voluntarily, with full awareness.
What it means: When he dies, he wants to be buried beside the road — so his restless spirit can keep travelling, even in death.
Why it matters: Even in death, the narrator refuses to settle. The highway represents freedom, movement, the refusal to be contained — even by a grave.
What it means: His spirit will board a bus (Greyhound is America's long-distance bus service) and keep moving — death won't stop his restless, devil-touched soul.
Why it matters: It's darkly humorous and deeply American. The image of a ghost catching a bus is absurd and poetic at once — the blues at its finest.
Robert Johnson (1911–1938) recorded only 29 songs before his death at 27, but those recordings became the foundation of modern blues, rock, and everything that followed. The legend of his crossroads deal — trading his soul to the devil for supernatural guitar skill — is one of the most enduring myths in American music. "Me and the Devil Blues" feeds directly into that mythology, with Johnson singing about the devil as a literal companion.
Anja Plaschg recorded her cover in 2013 for her EP Sugarbread. Born in 1990 in Graz, Austria, Plaschg is classically trained and creates music that draws from experimental electronics, classical piano, and a willingness to sit with discomfort that most artists avoid. Her version of Johnson's song strips away the blues swagger and replaces it with something rawer — the sound of someone confronting darkness without the armour of irony or defiance.
The song's placement in Dark — Netflix's German-language time-travel thriller — gave it a new cultural context. In a show about cycles, fate, and the coexistence of light and darkness within every character, "Me and the Devil" became a thematic statement: we all walk with our devils. The question isn't whether the darkness exists. It's how you carry it.
| Word / Phrase | Meaning | Example Sentence |
|---|---|---|
| side by side | Together, as equals, next to each other — implying partnership rather than hierarchy | "They worked side by side for twenty years." |
| the devil | The embodiment of evil in Christian tradition; figuratively, any destructive force or inner darkness | "He wrestled with his own devils for years before seeking help." |
| bury my body | To put someone's remains in the ground after death — here used with dark defiance rather than grief | "He wanted them to bury his body in the town where he was born." |
Soap&Skin is the musical project of Anja Plaschg, an Austrian musician, actress, and artist born in 1990 in Graz. Classically trained in piano and voice, she creates darkly atmospheric music that draws from experimental electronics, classical composition, and raw emotional intensity. Her covers — including "Me and the Devil" and her collaboration with Apparat on "Goodbye" — have connected her to millions of listeners through Netflix's Dark.
"Me and the Devil" teaches you how English handles the concept of inner darkness — "side by side," "the devil," and "bury my body" are phrases that carry layers of meaning depending on context. But the song's real value is how it shows that a piece of music can travel across centuries, continents, and cultures and still mean something. A blues song from 1938 Mississippi, reinterpreted by an Austrian woman in 2013, soundtracking a German TV show in 2017, going viral on a Chinese-owned app in 2024. The devil, it turns out, speaks every language.