In 1971, a documentary about Roy Buchanan aired on public TV; it was called The Best Unknown Guitarist in the World. The title remains apt today. Buchanan's gritty blues-rock playing entranced other guitarists such as Jeff Beck. But the Washington, D.C., virtuoso never caught the break he deserved, and in 1988, at age forty-eight, he took his own life while in jail for public drunkenness.