Train Music!

[christopher3393]

People Get Ready -- written and composed by Curtis Mayfield, 1965

 

People, get ready
There's a train a-coming
You don't need no ticket
You just get on board

 

All you need is faith
To hear the diesels humming
Don't need no ticket
You just thank the Lord.

 

 

The Impressions (w/ Curtis Mayfield)

 

The Chambers Brothers ( a favorite, had the album)

 

 

"People Get Ready" is in a long tradition of Black American freedom songs that use train imagery, such as "Wade in the Water", "The Gospel Train", and "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot". The imagery comes from the Underground Railroad, not a real train but an escape route North to freedom for escaped slaves in America pre-civil war, with conductors such as Harriet Tubman going back time and again to the South to show people the route of the "railroad". Images of mobility have been consistently linked to liberation in African American music including trains, highways, marching and space travel. ---wiki

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_Get_Ready

 

 

Aretha Franklin

 

 

 

One Love/People Get Ready (1984) - Bob Marley & The Wailers

 

 

 

[christopher3393]

Robert Johnson - Love In Vain Blues (Takes 1&2) (1937)

 

 

Love In Vain · The Rolling Stones

 

 

[christopher3393]

John Lee Hooker - Hobo blues

 

 

[christopher3393]

Mississippi Fred McDowell - Freight Train Blues

 

 

 

[christopher3393]

52 minutes ago, semente said:

 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Night Train · Jimmy Forrest (the original)

 

 

Louis Prima - Night Train (in which the train gets rollin')

 

 

James Brown performs Night Train on the TAMI Show (runaway train!)

 

 

[christopher3393]

The Memphis Train · Rufus Thomas

 

 

 

Memphis Train · Buddy Miles

 

 

[christopher3393]

 

Lonesome Train · Sonny Terry, Woody Guthrie, and Cisco Houston

 

 

https://folkways.si.edu/classic-railroad-songs-from-folkways/american-folk/music/album/smithsonian

[christopher3393]

The Loco-Motion - Little Eva

 

 

 

Grand Funk Railroad - The Loco-Motion

 

 

 

Kylie Minogue - The Loco-motion (apologize in advance)

 

 

[christopher3393]

Night Time in the Switching Yard (2007 Remaster) · Warren Zevon

 

 

Lightnin' Slim - Mean Ole Lonesome Train

 

 

 

Jimi Hendrix ~ Hear My Train A Comin' 

 

 

 

[christopher3393]

Lost My Drivin' Wheel written by Canadian folk artist David Wiffen

 

Tom Rush

 

 

Roger McGuinn

 

 

Cowboy Junkies

 

 

[christopher3393]

8:05 · Moby Grape

 

 

 

Train Leaves Here This Morning  · Eagles

 

 

Riding on a Railroad · James Taylor

 

 

Steve Goodman - City Of New Orleans ( an old personal favorite railroad song)

 

[christopher3393]

Train Whistle Blues' JIMMIE RODGERS (1929) 

 

 

Doc and Merle Watson - Train Whistle Blues

 

 

Train Whistle Blues · Merle Haggard 

 

 

Sonny Terry - Train Whistle Blues 1935 (different melody, harmonica instrumental by a blues harp great )

 

 

[christopher3393]

1 hour ago, clipper said:

 

 

Tom Lehrer - The Subway Song    

 

 

Dropkick Murphys - Skinhead On the M.B.T.A   

 

 

[christopher3393]

Speaking of Subways:

 

New York Dolls - Subway Train  

 

 

The Cure - Subway Song    

 

 

Down In The Subway · Soft Cell

 

 

Delacey - The Subway Song   

 

 

 

The Avalanches - Subways   

 

 

 

LONDONBEAT ~ 9AM   

 

 

 

Brooklyn Funk Essentials - Take The L Train (To 8th Avenue)    

 

 

 

Transit Ride - Guru Jazzmatazz Vol. I   

 

 

[christopher3393]

Perhaps not valid?  😊

 

 

[christopher3393]

1 hour ago, Iving said:

 

Efficiency award!

 

 

...wait, did you just punch my ticket? 🥴

 

 

[christopher3393]

 

[christopher3393]

Papa Lightfoot - Mean Ol' Train (1954)

 

 

FAST FREIGHT TRAIN..........." PEG LEG" SAM JACKSON

 

"Peg Leg Sam taught himself to play harmonica as a small child. He left home at the age of 12 and never stopped roving. He shined shoes, worked as a houseboy, cooked on ships, hoboed, and then made a living busking on street corners. He lost his leg in 1930, trying to hop a train but made a peg out of a fence post, bound it to his stub with a leather belt and kept moving.

 

He joined the medicine show circuit in 1937, often performing with Pink Anderson. His ability to play two harmonicas at once (while one went in and out of his mouth) made him an attraction; he could also play notes on a harmonica with his nose." -- wiki

 

 

 

Freight Train - Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee

 

"Blind harp wizard Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, a spectacular guitar picker, had a 35-year-long partnership that helped to define Folk/Blues."

 

 

[christopher3393]

The Brakeman's Blues (Yodeling the Blues Away) · Jimmie Rodgers (1928)

 

Rodgers worked as a brakeman and did a fair amount of hoboing.(hopping freight trains).

 

 

 As bluegrass by one of the greats: Brakeman's Blues · Bill Monroe & The Blue Grass Boys

 

 

Brakeman's Blues · Lefty Frizzell  (Countrified)

 

 

Brakeman's Blues (Incomplete) · Johnny Cash  (Memphis sound)

 

 

Punch Brothers (Chris Thile) Brakeman's Blues  (Contemporary folk/bluegrass in a commited live performance from a band that loves to play this song!)

 

 

[christopher3393]

 

train keeps a rollin'  🚆

 

On 4/4/2020 at 1:25 PM, sphinxsix said:

 

 

 

 

...soooo many covers of this one, including The Grateful Dead, Super Session featuring Al Kooper, Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills, The Allman Brothers Band, Marianne Faithfull, Jerry Garcia, Stephen Stills, Iain Matthews, Leon Russell, Little Feat, Chris Smither, Taj Mahal, Steve Earle, Levon Helm, Toto, Tracy Nelson, Blue Cheer 🤪 & Bun E. Carlos.

 

 

including a few with Bob:

 

 

[christopher3393]

...speaking of jazz

 

On 4/4/2020 at 11:58 AM, semente said:

 

 

 2 more train tunes from Duke Ellington:

 

Duke Ellington - Deep South Suite, Pt. 4 - Happy Go Lucky Local (1946)

 

 

 

Duke Ellington & His Orchestra: Daybreak Express (1933)  

 

 

Cab Calloway Orchestra on a train 1934: Railroad Rhythm    

 

 

 

Texas and Pacific: Louis Jordan and his Tympany Five (1947) Swing!

 

 

[christopher3393]

On 4/8/2020 at 12:19 PM, clipper said:

 

Doc Watson - Blue Railroad Train

 

 

[christopher3393]

On 4/8/2020 at 9:46 AM, Iving said:

How 'bout some proper Blues then!

 

Jesse Fuller - Lining Up the Track & Railroad Blues ...

 

Sam McGee - Railroad Blues ...

 

Lucille Bogan - I Hate That Train Called The M & O ...

 

Roosevelt Charles - Freight Train Blues ...

 

Bill Williams - Railroad Bill ...

 

Fred McDowell, Sidney Carter And Rose Hemphill - When The Train Comes Along ...

 

Rev. Robert Wilkins - Holy Ghost Train ...

 

Blues Train - Old Tree Blues ...

 

 

Great post!  Thanks!

 

 

 

[christopher3393]

On 4/8/2020 at 9:46 AM, Iving said:

How 'bout some proper Blues then!

 

Jesse Fuller - Lining Up the Track & Railroad Blues ...

 

 

 

5 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

Turns out the train theme is still dragging its long tail! Okay, it's hard to understand the interest in finding obscure blues artists, especially since the train theme is present permanently in this genre, and hundreds if not thousands of examples can be found without much difficulty. Why not turn to truly great musicians, such as Grateful Dead. Mentioned Casey Jones already. What else we could find?

 

• I Know You Rider: ”I wish I was a headlight on a north bound train..."
• Beat It Down a Line: “I’ll be waiting at the station, Lord, when that train pulls on by

 

Here ya go:

 

http://deadessays.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-grateful-dead-and-trains-guest-post.html

 

( note that the Garcia Band recorded a number of railroad covers not listed above)

 

Did you happen to know that I know You Rider is derived from several traditional black folk blues songs and then transformed into a white

folk song in the sixties? Joan Baez covered it. The Dead made it rock.

 

And did you happen to know that the dead covered a couple of songs by Jesse Fuller, one of those obsure blues guys mentioned above?

 

 

 

And the Dead covered 3 songs by an obscure folk blues band called Cannon's Jug Stompers? One of them is a train song:

 

 

 

 So, for me, it's more complicated. I believe that Jerry, Phil, and Bob -- and certainly Pigpen! -- had a different attitude about blues roots music than you do. And I share that. The list that lving posted is, to me, a great list. I know that in my guts and in my bones. It's a felt sense from having listened to (and played for a few years) a lot of blues, live and recorded. I grew up outside of Chicago. So where you may hear an uninspired static redundancy, I hear and feel a lot of life, dynamism, and variety. So many different approaches to railroad blues! Sometimes subtle, but not boring for me, and not second rate. Some of this old stuff is some of the very best recorded. I;m thinking of Robert Johnson, for example.

 

Fine if you don't hear it that way. Just a different experience.

 

 

 

[christopher3393]

57 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

 

NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS Train Long-suffering (1985)