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Post That Train Song Thread

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Wednesday, June 8, 2022 11:20 AM

Tim McGraw has a song called Train #10 on his 2007 album Let It Go, but it does not have much to do with trains, just waiting at a station.

He also recorded Ghost Town Train on his 2009 album Southern Voice, but this one has nothing to do with trains.

-Kevin

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Posted by Track fiddler on Wednesday, June 8, 2022 6:42 PM

Evening

 

SeeYou190

Tim McGraw has a song called Train #10 on his 2007 album Let It Go, but it does not have much to do with trains, just waiting at a station.

He also recorded Ghost Town Train on his 2009 album Southern Voice, but this one has nothing to do with trains.

Those are some good tunes Kevin.  I like McGraw and he has something to do with Trains Now.  Found another one of his songs with some good scenery for ya.

https://youtu.be/HTgTs3Ju9XA

 

maxman

I believe that it is time to rehang some telltales mid span of that bridge.  That will quickly cure him of some of that nonsense.

LaughLaugh Thats a good one Dick.  The hippie on the couch one you busted my gut with may take a while to top thoughLaugh...Wink

 

RGW

LOCOMOTIVE BREATH - Jethro Tull

 

Sorry I missed this one as I've always been a Tull fan RGW.  Now your talking.

https://youtu.be/7Ebwhu3nsM8

Good Yuks!

 

 

Thanks for sharing

 

 

TF

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Posted by Track fiddler on Wednesday, June 8, 2022 11:03 PM

Good night

Guess you can find anything if you look hard enough.  Found a Pink Floyd Train video out of Greece and there was only 11 views when I found it.

https://youtu.be/Q7-2RAc8-cQ

Who would have ever thunk it. Ride the Rails with Floyd.  Good tune too.

Check out when the train slows to engage the center traction rail as the grade steepens.....Kinda neat

 

 

PH

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Posted by Track fiddler on Thursday, June 9, 2022 7:06 AM

Good morning

Nothing better than some relaxing big band music to wake over coffee in the morning.  One can only appreciate how all the band members played perfectly in sync with one another back in the day.  A little train music mixed in makes it sound even better.

 

Moonlight Serenade 

https://youtu.be/FylMr6KN1Bw

 

We certainly have had a good run with everyone's contributions making this a really fun thread.  Of course it wouldn't be complete without.....

 

The Subway Song

https://youtu.be/O2pODoQ4e8M

 

 

I'd like to Thank Everyone who has participated in the Train Song ThreadWink

 

 

 

Track Fiddler

 

 

 

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, June 9, 2022 7:26 AM

Try this one... kind of slow...

Railroad Lady by Willie Nelson on his 1977 album From Lefty To Willie.

-Kevin

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Posted by Track fiddler on Thursday, June 9, 2022 8:42 AM

Good one Kevin

Willie Nelson version (animated HD sound)

https://youtu.be/XNc4YFUbZrs

Jimmy Buffett version (F7's and classic cars)

https://youtu.be/xrIQ4Lw3NCc

 

Thanks for the suggestion.

 

 

One more of a classic blues oldie with instruments as train sounds and sax as the whistle.

Junior Parker

https://youtu.be/Ewxg5U5BFnU

 

 

Thanks Again EveryoneWink

 

 

 

TF

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, June 9, 2022 9:02 AM

Track fiddler
Good one Kevin

Glad you liked it.

Nanci Griffith recorded three train songs that I know of.

Southbound Train from Flyer (1994)

Morning Train from Blue Roses From The Moon (1997)

Last Train Home from Hearts In Mind (2004)

The live version of Last Train Home from the album Winter Marquee is wonderful.

I always thought of Nanci Griffith as the female version of John Prine. There is a video clip of them performing The Speed Of The Sound Of Loneliness together that is fantastic. 

It is a shame we have recently lost both of these performers.

-Kevin 

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DrW
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Posted by DrW on Thursday, June 9, 2022 6:31 PM

Well, I am aware that Captain Beefheart might not be everybody's cup of tea. However, his song "Click Clack" from the album "The Spotlight Kid" clearly qualifies as train song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7DdDeuxo10

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, June 9, 2022 7:36 PM

I know Love Train by the O'Jays was already mentioned, but...

Did you know The Wiggles recorded a cover of this song?

Well, they did, and it is every bit as terrible as you might fear.

(59) Love Train - YouTube

Just awful.

-Kevin

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Posted by xboxtravis7992 on Thursday, June 9, 2022 8:38 PM

This one isn't even a year old yet being released in late summer 2021, and might be the contender for the youngest in the thread; The Killer's Quiet Town:

The grade crossing tragedy referenced in the opening of Quiet Town is based on a real accident in rural Utah that occured in 1994: https://www.deseret.com/1994/11/8/19141467/2-juab-students-who-died-in-train-car-crash-mourned

From the same album as Quiet Town, this track In The Car Outside also has a strong railway connection with the final guitar bridge imitating the sound of a railway crossing. The collector's lyric book even shows a diagram of valve gear, pistons and wheels on a steam locomotive to accompany the song. 



City of New Orleans has been mentioned already, but IMHO this is the definative performance of it from The Highwaymen.  



Not train songs per-se, but Dan Auerbach's solo stuff and his work through The Black Keys and his record label Easy Eye Sound love dropping trains into music videos and lyric snippets. He has been photographed in a vest with PRR and C&O patches before, so the dude is a bit of a lowkey foamer. One of his songs off his solo album has a music video shot in the Utah railroad town of Helper, and plenty of trains sneak around elsewhere.


 

From Auerbach's label also comes the restored vintage audio of Son House's Empire State Express as well. 

Rush's stoner/prog classic, A Passage to Bangkok and its titular train.

My favorite music video shot on a moving train? Queen's late career track Breakthru filmed behind a restored British steam engine.

Special mention to another shot on a moving train video, Piano Guy's Code Name Vivaldi performance with the finale shot onboard the Heber Valley Railroad. 

 Finally its such an incidental mention of railways and not a main part of the song, but I have to give kudos to how the mention of railroading as brief as it is adds to the atmospheric mood of The War on Drug's In Reverse.

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Posted by derf on Friday, June 10, 2022 11:33 AM

Lee Hazlewood's "Long Black Train" and "The Railroad" from his "Trouble is a lonesome town" album              

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Friday, June 10, 2022 12:46 PM

How about The Trolley Song? The iconic version was recorded by Judy Garland in 1944.

-Kevin

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Posted by hon30critter on Sunday, June 12, 2022 1:30 AM

Here is a train song that could also be posted to the June Diner, but I thougjht it would be more fitting here. Click on 'Watch on TouTube' (It may take a second to appear):

Dave

I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Saturday, June 25, 2022 12:53 AM

Sicilian Train Blues by Roger Manning.

This one might be hard to find. It was on the Los Angeles based SST label,and released in 1989.

There was an accoustic version released in 1991 on an SST sampler compiliation, which is the one I prefer.

<EDIT> I found it on YouTube.

(72) The Sicilian Train Blues - YouTube

-Kevin

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, June 30, 2022 3:25 PM

I just found out that Gilbert & Sullivan wrote an entire musical called "The Mikado", so there must be some train songs in there.

Whistling

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Posted by Pantherphil on Thursday, June 30, 2022 9:23 PM

Anybody mention Folsom Prison Blues by the Man in Black?

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Saturday, July 2, 2022 11:32 AM

So... it seems that the legendary Count Basie & His Orchestra had a tune called Super Chief, which sounds like it should be a train song. However, it is instrumental, so no train lyrics.

But, I think this is the creepiest album cover I have ever seen:

-Kevin

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Posted by Overmod on Saturday, July 2, 2022 10:22 PM

Well, I looked to find a link, and look at the album cover...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKUm7nDzTyE

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Posted by SD70Dude on Tuesday, July 5, 2022 1:59 PM

For lyrics mentioning trains, does 'House of the Rising Sun' count?  ("one foot on the platform, the other foot on the train").

I just skimmed through the thread so I might have missed them, but I don't think I saw Johnny Horton's 'Coal Smoke, Valve Oil and Steam" mentioned:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swo1AVDTLVo

Or Neil Young's 'Southern Pacific', this live version is my favourite railroad song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21ph2y3EYNI

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Posted by ricktrains4824 on Wednesday, July 6, 2022 2:59 PM

Let's see if I can still remember how to do video's...

Night Train - Jason Aldean

As an aside, I actually learned how to play Night Train, but I have no vids of that. (You wouldn't like my singing voice anyways. Laugh)

I also didn't see Rosanne Cash's Runaway Train, nor Cam's same titled but totally different song, Runaway Train.

Cam's is not my favorite song by her, but fits well here.

(Hopefully the vid's work now...)

Ricky W.

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Posted by ricktrains4824 on Wednesday, July 6, 2022 3:02 PM

Ok.... The vids work, but what language are the stupid labels in????? No clue how I did that! Indifferent

Ricky W.

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Posted by mvlandsw on Friday, July 8, 2022 9:47 PM

Kenny Rodger's "Lucille". Not much train related but it starts out "In a bar in Toledo, across from the depot"

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Posted by John-NYBW on Saturday, July 9, 2022 9:48 AM

SD70Dude

For lyrics mentioning trains, does 'House of the Rising Sun' count?  ("one foot on the platform, the other foot on the train").

You are allowed to put House of the Rising Sun into any discussion. One of the greatest Rock n' Roll songs of all time.

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Posted by John-NYBW on Saturday, July 9, 2022 9:54 AM

I was just looking at somebody's list of the greatest Rock n' Roll songs of all time and it had Jethro Tull's Locomotive Breath listed. I remember Jethro Tull but don't remember this song at all. Does anybody know what it is about and whether it would classify as a train song?

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Posted by trwroute on Saturday, July 9, 2022 10:19 AM

My favorite- 

Long Train Running by the Doobie Brothers.  Guaranteed full-blast volume every time!

Chuck - Modeling in HO scale and anything narrow gauge

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Saturday, July 9, 2022 10:55 AM

John-NYBW
Jethro Tull's Locomotive Breath listed. I remember Jethro Tull but don't remember this song at all. Does anybody know what it is about and whether it would classify as a train song?

Locomotive Breath is NOT about trains. The songs lyrics mention Charlie being at the throttle and his children getting off at the stations one by one. Then Charlie goes mad, breaks the handle off the throttle so the train runs out of control, and even god cannot stop the train after he takes the handle back.

For years, it was assumed the song was about the Charles Manson family.

Ian Anderson, who wrote the song, has been quoted over the past decade saying the song is actually about population growth destroying the planet.

I don't buy that. I think the song always has been about Charles Manson, and now he wishes he would have written it about something else.

Look up the lyrics and see what conclusion you come to.

-Kevin

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Posted by MarknLisa on Saturday, July 16, 2022 9:15 AM

New favorite train song. Ride by Walter Trout

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLzmOugNc2I

 

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Saturday, July 16, 2022 12:07 PM

MarknLisa
New favorite train song. Ride by Walter Trout

Absolutely excellent and completely enjoyable.

Thank you for the share.

-Kevin

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Posted by BATMAN on Saturday, July 16, 2022 4:23 PM

MarknLisa

New favorite train song. Ride by Walter Trout

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLzmOugNc2I

 

 

YesYes

Brent

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Posted by mvlandsw on Saturday, July 16, 2022 5:44 PM

Juice Newton - Queen Of Hearts - YouTube

"Midnight, and I'm awaiting on the twelve-oh-five, hopin it'll will take me just a little farther down the line."

Another song with minimal railroad connection but the beginning of the video has some shots of a live steam train.

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