By Andy Gill

The gulf separating Europe and America has been steadily widening. Having long since sacrificed truth on the altar of commerce, the Hollywood film industry now routinely tramples over foreign sensibilities with a disdain bordering on contempt; the country's mainstream music industry is little better, although - despite the efforts of its MTV propaganda arm - less effective in promoting American "values" abroad. For all the success of Britney and Eminem, there are still huge differences in transatlantic tastes, even in Anglophone territories.

The real extent of the gulf, though, is better indicated by considering the other side of the cultural import/export equation. Old stagers such as Sting and the Stones may still be able to shift substantial quantities of albums, but US tastes remain impervious to anything more recent.

Encouraged by their rulers' smug isolationism, American listeners have become literally ignorant of foreign culture. Which is why Train Leaves at Eight is such a shocking record. Here's an American group, based in Seattle, doing an album of songs from continental Europe, offering their interpretations of material by artists as diverse as Goran Bregovic, Jacques Brel, Neu! and Stina Nordenstam. Its success is rooted in The Walkabouts' refusal to consider foreign parts as simply markets to be conquered. Instead, there's a heartening attempt to understand the character of alien cultures, realised through sensitive arrangements that favour the refined tones of accordion, strings and horns and take due care with lyrical issues.

The results are almost completely successful: Brel's "People Such As These" is whispered over a desultory backing that's an apposite representation of a Gallic shrug, and Vlado Kreslin's lament for the plight of Balkan gypsies, "That Black Guitar", receives a violin-laced folk-rock treatment akin to the rhapsodic swirl of Dylan's Desire.

Elsewhere, more adventurous strategies are used to illuminate the songs: the air of suspension in Neu!'s "Leb' Wohl" is deftly achieved through a detuned vocal murmur and sound effects of rippling waves and midnight trains, while the original sample-collage of Solex's "Solex in a Slipshod Style" is rendered here with real instruments, including the deep, sax-like tones of bass harmonica.

The group's keen appreciation of the various cultural strains can be discerned from their decision to present the 14 tracks as two separate "sides", reflecting the differences between northern and southern Europe. The latter - taking in Theodorakis, Portuguese fado and Catalan anti-Franco protest - are generally more outward-looking, romantic and political; the northern songs, by contrast, are rather darker and more interiorised, concerned with matters of mortality and the difficulties posed by acute introspection.

But from whichever angle one views Train Leaves At Eight, it's a courageous undertaking that deserves attention. Unless you want to listen to Eminem and Britney for ever, that is."

Over the past decade, Seattle-based outfit the Walkabouts have evolved from alternative country-folk punk to heady lush Americana lined with dark and moody edges. Train Leaves At Eight is a conceptual disc of 14 cover songs from Europe's Leonard Cohen counterparts, including cuts from Belgium's Jacques Brel ("People Such As These"), Italy's Fabrizio de Andre ("Disamistade") and Spain's Lluis Llach ("Silenci"). Inviting a stellar cast of guests such as Peter Buck (R.E.M.), Scott McCaughley (Minus Five) and pianist Robin Holcomb, among many others, the Walkabouts turn into an orchestra dedicated to massaging the heart into a pulp. Only longing and melancholy wait at the next train stop as band leaders Chris Eckman and Carla Torgerson's depressed vocals explain. Like Roger Water's post-Floyd epic The Pros And Cons of Hitchhiking, Train... is about movement, and being moved.

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