(UMOD)

Walk through the streets of St Albans (or any other major city) on market day and take a moment to listen to the tunes being strummed by the musicians standing at convenient byways. Odds are you’ll hear some of the tracks included in this collection, which really is a buskers’ songbook for the modern age.

Forget Streets of London and the typical Beatles covers, today’s street musician is much more likely to be playing something by James Morrison, David Gray or Jake Bugg (yes, and Ed Sheeran, but he’s notably absent from this set), and reaping the rewards from their carefully crafted compositions in the process!

But it’s not all about the money, for contemporary performers, these singer-songwriters are their heroes and their aspirations, proof positive that with the right talent you can make the leap from street corner to stadium.

There are certainly enough inspirational tunes in this collection to keep even the most prolific busker working overtime, and not all of them obvious choices, which keeps the progression of tracks nice and fresh.

Personal favourites include Take Me To Church from Hozier, Lana Del Rey’s Video Games, AKA What A Life from Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, and Amy McDonald’s This Is The Life, but with 60 remarkable songs over three CDs there’s no shortage of decent material which could prompt anyone to pick up a guitar and start strumming.