Album review: Tom Jones, Praise & Blame

Published on Wednesday 14 July 2010 11:29

TOM JONES Praise & Blame *** Island 2741297, £13.99

What happened in Vegas should not necessarily stay in Vegas, as the mighty Welsh crooner who built a career in the Nevada desert goes back to his ecclesiastical roots. Unfortunately it sometimes smacks of a sepia-tinted quickie wedding chapel rather than the gnarled wood of the pews in his local church in Pontypridd, but his honest intentions prevail.

Nothing works as directly as the single, a stripped back reading of John Lee Hooker's Burning Hell, just raw bottleneck guitar and a 70-year-old man's voice. Nobody's Fault But Mine is cut from similar cloth. Opening the record with What Good Am I suggests Jones is setting himself a test, but in truth he only occasionally scales the heights required. Not terribly clever is inviting an unflattering comparison to Johnny Cash by covering Aint No Grave, the anti-spiritual featured on Cash's last ever American Recordings.

The closing Run On has been heard before as God's Gonna Cut You Down, which could be the fire and brimstone condemnation of record label boss, David Sharpe. He was supposedly furious that the new album sounded like a collection of hymns, despite being told some months ago that that was Jones' avowed intention.

Download this: Burning Hell, Nobody's Fault But Mine