The search continues folks. Yes, its time to put yet another AUK writer into the hot seat. All each one has to do is to cast their eye across the whole history of americana and pick out just 10 albums that represent their personal top 10 ever. Simple really, only it’s not, as most have testified. In fact, if it wasn’t for this wretched pandemic, then the country’s hospitals would almost certainly be packed to the rafters with AUK writers suffering from nervous exhaustion, anxiety, palpitations and flashbacks to the ones they forgot to include. This week Dave Jarman steps nervously forward to join in with this act of collective masochism:
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There are musical moments in your life that are of such significance that you will remember them forever. I recall buying my first record, going to my first gig and lying in bed as a 15-year-old listening to John Peel play ‘New Rose’ by The Damned. I wish that I could similarly pinpoint the first time that I heard Tom T Hall, but alas, I can’t. He just seemed to always be there, occasionally referenced by artists or in the media whenever the conversation turned to great songwriters. Then in 1998, by which time my affection for Dave Vanian, Rat Scabies and Captain Sensible had long since waned, a tribute album was released – ‘Real: The Tom T Hall Project’. 
Johnny Cash had a career that would take a very large book or two to encapsulate and this Mojo sampler from 2004 offers 15 tracks that only represent the briefest overview with a variety of disparate artists offering their takes on the man’s work. It is a good selection though and worth a listen; the cover versions fascinate in the way the somehow do. 