When Moby sampled Vera Ward Hallโ€™s โ€œTrouble So Hardโ€, he was merely the latest in a long line of musicians to use as a source the field recordings made in the Deep South between 1933 and 1959 by the folklorist Alan Lomax. The Popular Songbook collects together 22 such tracks and, perhaps to your surprise, youโ€™ll find you know almost every one of them?if not in these original versions then in covers by artists as diverse as Clapton, Miles Davis, Steve Miller, Dylan, Led Zep and The Grateful Dead. File alongside the Harry Smithโ€™s Anthology Of American Folk Music.