Tom T. Hall- New Train, Same Rider

We are continuing this week with records that a bought only to discover a different record inside. I know. Perhaps I should do a better job of checking these out before I buy.  Well when they are only a buck, I just roll the dice. It is not worth my time to insect every album.  Well, I got this for a dollar.  I am not an overly huge Conway Twitty fan but felt that it would be a good addition to the site and I could learn more about his catalog.

What I got when I got home was a record by country singer/songwriter, and novelist Tom T. Hall.  Hall wrote such country songs such as “Harper Valley PTA” and “Hello Vietnam”.  Hall, born in Olive Hill, Kentucky in 1936 has written 11 #1 songs as well as another 26 that made the Top Ten. Known as “The Storyteller”, Hall is still kicking it today.

 

This record, New Train Same Rider, was Hall’s 16th if I can count right.  Released in 1978 in RCA, it is actually a pretty good album.  I liked it.  Perhaps I liked it more than I would the Twitty album.  It features songs written by Hall such as “Come Back To Nashville”, “No One Feels My Hurt” and “Mabel, You Have Been A Friend To Me” as well as tunes written by others such as “Whiskey”, and “Dark Hollow”.  Pretty straight forward 70’s country.  In all, a pretty good album.

 

However, there was this one song that I felt was quite hokey. Released as a single that went #13 in the US and #5 in Canada, “May The Force Be With You” no doubt is a novelty gimmick designed to take advantage of the massive success of Star Wars.  This song is like a train wreck.  It is ugly but I can not dare to look away.  So here it is as a sample.  I would like to say that there are much better songs on this album, but this is the one that stuck.

 

Overall, despite this number, this is a really good album and as stated before, I believe I made out better with this than the original purchase. Satisfactory.

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