I'm sure it's been done, but I had this idea after listening to one of my favorite musicians, Mark Knopfler, formerly of Dire Straits. On one of his solo albums, Shangri-La, is the song "5:15 AM" which is extremely descriptive of the setting, in which a miner going home at, you guessed it, 5:15 AM comes across a man murdered in a "giant car, a Mark X Jaguar" - well giant by Britics car standards.
But we have the setting for a rail servier coal mine village - the opening lines are very descriptive of what's along the road the miner os traveling to get to his home.
So - late 60's Northeast England wintertime layout in the typical 'exposition' format such as mentioned in MRP 2019 in Ian Rice's article? Or - in the next to last verse, there is a journey back in time to 1867. Many of the structures for the village itself would actually be the same for either era.
The song is based on a fairly well known (well, in England anyway) case of a man found shot dead in a car on the side of the road in a mining town near Mark's home town, whe he was about 17. Mob related, in the operationa dn collection of money from "fruit machines" - what they call slot machines. Alternate term of "one armed bandit" seems universal.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
One could also imagine a layout based on a struggling branch line serving the charming if bizarre little seaside town featured in the film "Local Hero" -- just to keep the Mark Knopfler link intact. One of my favorite films, and a great score.
Dave Nelson
Waste of a good Jaguar!
Seriously, it would make an interesting scene.
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
Wot? Topped in a Jag-u-ar, you say? My word!
Wayne
doctorwayneWot? Topped in a Jag-u-ar, you say? My word!
Thank goodness that many of them had red leather interiors. At least the blood wouldn't show!
I owned one once. I never drove it. It was a basket case. The rear suspension framing was completely rusted away, but I bought it on an immature whim, and I had great hopes. Unfortunately hopes cost money and I didn't have any at the time. I ended up giving it to a friend who had one that was on the road for spare parts.
Like my MGC, I should have kept the thing, but alas, poverty has its limits.
Yes, Local Hero is a good film. And great music. But it's instrumental, the theme song doesn't really convey any images :D
The Jag E-Type is probably the sexiest car ever built. The Mark X's - not so much. They get a mention in the song as well.
BTW they missed a HUGE chance to use Mark's "Boom Like That" for the movie The Founder, with Micheal Keaton, great flick about Ray Kroc. Watching that, the entire beginning part was exactly what I pictured Kroc doing from the lyrics of the song.
Interesting about tying a song to a layout theme. Another song to follow is "I've Been Working on the Railroad." While I only work on the layout about 45 min nightly, it sometimes seems all day!
Last summer, my son and a couple of his friends helped me move some tractor stuff around, later, on the back patio admiring our work, radio on, classic rock station, Money for Nothing came on, one of guys stated what a great guitar on that song, and I asked if they ever seen the video? from Dire Straits, and Mark Knopfler?
He looked at me and said "Video? I've never even heard of the band". And then I realized none of them had even been born yet, in 1985.
OOOPS, never mind, I deleted the video, it does have kind of a naughty scene.
Mike.
My You Tube
My best part about that song is there is a YouTube video of Knopfler talking about how he cam eup witht he song, and he explaisn how 'easy' it is to play the signature sound. LOL yeah, 'easy' if you have his level of guitar talent.
My kids, especially my younger one who is in to keyboards and synthesizers, likes plenty of the older stuff like Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman.