Review of Alan Lomax : Popular Songbook
The late Alan Lomax, like his father John A. Lomax before him, was one of America’s most influential and tireless scholars and chroniclers of folk and ethnic music. Yet Lomax also enthusiastically embraced rock n’ roll as it became a powerful cultural force in the 1950s. He also had a life-long fascination with the evolution of music performances and how particular songs were adapted from one style or era to the next.

This intriguing 22-song collection was culled from the hundreds of grassroots recordings that Lomax, who died in 2002 at 87, collected from the early 1930s, onward. The common thread is that they have all found their way, in one form or another, into the lexicon of modern rock and pop music. Cuts like Leadbelly’s 1934 rendition of "Midnight Special," Woody Guthrie’s 1940 recording of an old slave lament called "Goin’ Down The Road Feelin’ Bad," the Cleveland Simmons Group’s 1935 version of "Sloop John B," the Duke of Iron’s 1946 calypso version of "Ugly Woman," and Georgia Turner’s 1937 "House Of The Rising Sun" offer vivid glimpses at how great songs evolve with changing times and changing tastes, as they are passed from one generation of musicians to the next. --Bob Allen

Users's Reviews - Alan Lomax : The Secret Origins of Moby
I already had a passing knowledge of the work of Alan Lomax before I first heard Moby's "Play" album in 2001. But the strangely exhilerating sound of the sampled Lomax field recordings mixed with electronic dance beats, made me curious to find and hear the original recordings. And I've really been meaning to do that -- since 2001. Fortunately, Rounder has done some serious legwork for me: "Popular Songbook" includes three tracks used by Moby for "Play" ("Sometimes", "Joe Lee's Rock", and Trouble So Hard" were heavily sampled in Moby's "Honey", "Find My Baby" and "Natural Blues", respectively), and the 1959 original version of "Didn't Leave Nobody But the Baby", which was re-worked and performed in the "O Brother Where Art Thou" soundtrack. Plus a 1937 "Midnight Special" by Lead Belly, a truly rockin' 1947 "Stagolee" by Memphis Slim, and that's just for starters. I have read some rather condescending reviews of this collection from folk music academics, getting all sniffy at the notion of 21st Century radio airplay dictating the track choices for a folk music collection -- yeah, whatevah! For us middlebrow-type music lovers who've been meaning to check out this Alan Lomax guy but never quite gotten around to it, "Popular Songbook" is a good starter kit.

Your latest reviews - Alan Lomax : Black timey music
Too much of the general view of socalled old time music comes from the suburban, middle class people, who retreat to it thinking they are getting to something so white, so "celtic" that culturally they are making the same flight from Black people musically that they have made residentially.

However, we pervade. This is real old time music, the Black music that is at the core and foundation of Southeastern American traditional music. You see it, you feel it, in all its glory right here.

This is the Black old time string band and dance music that was ignored by record companies that only wanted blues out of Black artists and by most folklorists who by an large were only interested in blues, work songs, or songs they in their narrow point of view could directly pin as African Survivals. This is a great broad survey to open you up to the music. After you see this, you will be impelled to search for more. A good help is my own listmania list on Old Time music from a Black point of view.

Last week, I kept just the first selection, Jimmy Strother's "Cripple Creek" repeating on my CD for a couple hours. It was not just the great banjo playing, but the lyrics with real meaning: "Read and Run, Read and Run, don't let the sundown catch you here," Strothers sings from inside a Virginia prison.

Syd Hemphil's recordings here are very important. Hemphil is not just a fiddler, a blues artist, a font of Mississippi folk tradition, but he was a leader in the African quills and drums, Mississippi Hill Country, fife and drum band tradition. Here Hemphil PlayS in a band of fiddle, banjo, guitar AND DRUM! Despite the attempts of the slave masters to surpress the drums for fear they would call us to rebellion, the drum remains integral to this music.

More well known because of the Altamont recordings is the John Lusk band one of the wildest, great string bands, Black and white of all time. I could go on and and on about every one of these selections. However, rather than reading more of my words, you need to listen to more of this music!

Many, including myself, have written about the limitations of John and Alan Lomax in their collection and writing and shaping of American traditional music through lenses they want it to be seen with. However,the more important point is they went out and found this music, recorded this music, made it breathe out to the public by their connection with the initial 1930s folk song movement, and Alan continued that association to his death a few years back!