Train Music!

[AnotherSpin]

 

[AnotherSpin]

 

[AnotherSpin]

 

[christopher3393]

2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Nobody wants to read two adults bicker back and forth. Enough of the nonsense. We all have bigger fish to fry and have limited mental capacity for such nonsense. People come here to have fun and enjoy this wonderful hobby.

 

You've got it wrong. Read the thread.

[The Computer Audiophile]

5 hours ago, christopher3393 said:

 

You've got it wrong. Read the thread.

I tried and I didn't understand it. I saw @AnotherSpin and @sphinxsix bicker with each other and detracting from what I thought was a normal thread that I just didn't understand. 

 

Please enlighten me if the conversation between these two was appropriate and shouldn't have been removed. 

[Iving]

Thread is effectively vandalised by @AnotherSpin nitpicking other people's posts. 

 

This is not an adversarial thread. If it's not fun it's nothing.

 

Agree with @christopher3393 - 

@The Computer Audiophile has misunderstood.

 

It's not my forum and I have neither the knowledge nor inclination for supervision. Had sent PM to @The Computer Audiophile requesting advice yesterday evening [UK] but no response.

[The Computer Audiophile]

10 minutes ago, Iving said:

It's not my forum and I have neither the knowledge nor inclination for supervision. Had sent PM to @The Computer Audiophile requesting advice yesterday evening [UK] but no response.

I intervened on your behalf and removed several offending posts, including those by AnotherSpin. Now you guys say I was wrong for doing that. Please help me understand. 

[Iving]

8 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I intervened on your behalf and removed several offending posts, including those by AnotherSpin. Now you guys say I was wrong for doing that. Please help me understand. 

 

I didn't see the bickering that was removed. I have only seen what is still here.

 

I just ask @AnotherSpin to get with the cordial and recreational spirit of the thread or get lost.

 

Thank you

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, Iving said:

 

I didn't see the bickering that was removed.

[Iving]

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

Didn't see that.

 

Pity isn't it.

 

My view is the same regards who and/or what contaminated the thread.

[The Computer Audiophile]

That's what I was referring to about bickering etc...

[Iving]

OK. The baiting goes back further. I'm afraid I have no moderating experience. I might have asked contributors to desist more directly but didn't want to do that toothless.

 

Hopefully this will be an end to it.

[Iving]

13 hours ago, Iving said:

The Almanac SIngers - Union Train ...

 

 

Well - not far back I posted "Union Train" sung by The Almanac Singers - featuring of course Pete Seeger.

 

If there's one thing I've gotten out of this thread to date - it's a deepening of what I already value - the provenance of music I dig.

 

e.g. I was already aware of Jimmie Rodgers - but now I will think more of him when listening to Country and everything that stems from it - including my favourite genre Rockabilly.

 

I'm not an instinctive Jazz aficionado - except for upbeat Dixie and the like. I do love Western Swing.

 

Separating genres in music is like distilling knowledge into school subjects - it's an artificial exercise - even if it can be claimed that it is a pragmatic one.

 

Now I'm a Brit - even if endowed >50% with Irish blood - but I appreciate American folk as much as English (not to mention Celtic) - although the two are very different in character to my own ears and emotions. I have a deep appreciation for Joan Baez amongst others (having put my money where my mouth is with "Longest Train I Ever Saw" on p.1 of this thread). In my personal Music Library I have my own genre "Americana". It speaks to me of American tradition - which I may not understand very well being a foreigner - but do still enjoy. How could I not - having been such an out-of-era Rockabilly nut since a teenager.

 

Back to Pete Seeger. I got "Union Train" off of "Dust Bowl Blues". I hear this kind of music differently to Country as epitomised by Jimmie Rodgers. Woody Guthrie was involved in the establishment of The Almanac Singers in the early 1940s.

 

Establishing the provenance of chronologically deep Folk music can be a mighty challenge!

 

I got bogged down trying to find the origins of "900 miles" aka later "500 miles" - and this thread could pursue the matter legitimately for several pages. Hint! Hint!

 

Perhaps the first published recording was Fiddlin' John Carson in 1924 ...

 

 

Focusing now on just two other pivots, here are the lyrics attributed to the sung version from Woody Guthrie circa 1940s ...

 

I am walkin' down this track
I've got tears in my eyes
I'm tryin' to read a letter from my home

An' if  this train runs me right
I'll be home Saturday night
'Cause I'm nine hundred miles from my home
Lord I hate to hear
That lonesome whistle blow

This train I ride on
Is a hundred coaches long
Well, you can hear her whistle blow
A million miles

An' if this train runs me right
I'll see my woman on saturday night
'Cause I'm nine hundred miles from my home
Lord I hate to hear
That lonesome whistle blow

I will pawn you my wagon
And I will pawn you my team
I will pawn you my watch and my chain

An' if  this train runs me right
I'll be home Saturday night
'Cause I'm nine hundred miles from my home
Lord I hate to hear
That lonesome whistle blow
That long lonesome train whistlin' down

 

Hedy West is credited with "re-writing" this song for her eponymous 1963 Album (with 5-string banjo!) ...

 

If you miss the train I'm on, you will know that I am gone,
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.
Hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles.
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.

If my honey said so, I'd railroad no more,
I'd sidetrack my engine and go home.
And go home, and go home, and go home, and go home.
I'd sidetrack my engine and go home.

Lord, I'm one, Lord, I'm two, Lord, I'm three, Lord, I'm four,
Lord, I'm five hundred miles away from home.
Away from home, away from home, away from home, away from home,
Lord, I'm five hundred miles away from home.

I told my little Ella, just as plain as I could tell her
That she'd better come along and go with me.
Go with me, go with me, go with me, go with me;
She'd better come along and go with me.

My clothes are all worm and my shoes are all torn,
Lord, I can't make a livin' this a-way.
This a-way, this a-way, this a-way, this a-way,
Lord, I can't make a livin' this a-way.

If this train runs on right, I'll be home tomorrow night,
For I'm coming down the line on Number Nine.
Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine, Number Nine,
For I'm coming down the line on Number Nine.

Not a shirt on my back, not a penny to my name,
Lord, I can't go back home this a-way.
This a-way, this a-way, this a-way, this a-way
Lord I can't go back home this a-way.

If you miss the train I'm on, You will know that I am gone
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.
Hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles.
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.

 

 

I'll close this post before it gets too long with a version that one can easily discern to have followed in the wake of Hedy West's - The Seekers with Judith Durham ...

 

 

[Iving]

Oops forgot. See how important this song is??!!!

 

Tear drops fell on mama's note
When I read the things she wrote
She said, we miss you girl
We love you come on home
Well I didn't have to pack
I had it all right on my back
Now I'm five hundred miles away from home

Away from home, away from home
Cold and tired and all alone
Yes, I'm five hundred miles away from home

It's hard to tell the state I'm in
Where I'm going, where I've been
But there's a dream I've been following so long
If mama knew the things I've done
She'd forgive them everyone
But I'm still five hundred miles away from home

Away from home, away from home
Cold and tired and all alone
Yes, I'm five hundred miles away from home

Can't remember when I ate
it's just thumb and walk and wait
And I'm still five hundred miles away from home
If my luck had been just right
I'd be with them all tonight
But I'm still five hundred miles away from home

Away from home, away from home
Cold and tired and all alone
Yes, I'm five hundred miles away from home

Lord, I'm still five hundred miles away from home

 

OK - I grant you. Gene doesn't mention trains. But he couldn't have created this beautiful performance without the Train in the first place! That's the whole point!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Iving]

Dion ...

 

[Iving]

How many miles? 900 according to The New Christy Minstrels ...

 

[Iving]

How many miles? 500 per Jackie DeShannon ...

 

[Iving]

Yep - 500 per Peter, Paul & Mary ...

 

Live

 

[Iving]

With great panache Richie Havens declares 900 ...

 

[Iving]

Sonny & Cher - 500 ...

 

[Iving]

Judee Sill agrees with 500 ...

 

[Iving]

The Journeymen with the preposterous combined talent of Scott McKenzie and John Phillips ...

 

Very minor On Topic diversion - "Black Girl" aka "In The Pines" is also a Trains song - roll up here for The Journeymen ...

 

[Iving]

More talent - Bert Jansch unsurprisingly 900 with matching lyrics ...

 

[Iving]

Same for John Fahey [even if instrumental - it's still 900] ...

 

[Iving]

Glen just has to be different - only 100 ...