Various Artists

Various Artists

All Aboard: A Tribute To Johnny Cash

[3.5/5]

Johnny Cash was present at the birth of rock ’n’ roll, a country kid dressed in black when gothic was a recent development in British literature. He was one of the all-time great singer-songwriters, at turns political, personal, menacing and funny. Punk luminaries try on Cash’s dark duster on All Aboard, and some wear it surprisingly well. Straightforward covers of “Delia’s Gone” and “Folsom Prison Blues” by Lucero’s Ben Nichols and Love Equals Death’s Chon Travis, respectively, are blandly meh. Counteracting that, MxPx and the Bouncing Souls winningly punk up “Hey Porter” and “Man In Black.” The more adventurous versions are best, though: The Dresden Dolls with the Hold Steady’s Franz Nicolay reinvent “Ballad Of A Teenage Queen” for a Celtic cabaret, and Smoke Or Fire’s Joe McMahon gives the anti-nostalgic “Let The Train Whistle Blow” the Dashboard Confessional treatment-if Cash were alive to hear its mournful mariachi horn melody, he’d wish he just might wish he’d done it that way. (ANCHORLESS) D.X. Ferris

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