I'm still shaking my head. Thinking this is the greatest thing ever but why is it? How did it get into the University of South Carolina archives?
I've Been Hardly Working On The Railroad Too Long
https://mirc.sc.edu/islandora/object/usc%3A46256
"Casey Jones" by the Grateful Dead
-Ken in Maryland (B&O modeler, former CSX modeler)
Last Train to London, by E.L.O.
Just an allusion, but as evocative as much of the good stuff by Bukka White, is the grade-crossing signal at the very beginning of the Quicksilver Messenger Service cover of "Who Do You Love", one of the very best of the 'classic' prog-rock tracks.
I had, and have lost, the URL to a song by a bluegrass band, with a title something like 'Evening Train', which ended with a completely recognizable Amtrak K5LA chord on fiddle. Anyone know what it is? (it was on YouTube or another downloadable service)
And what was the Oliver song from the '60s with the three-cylinder steam locomotive effect?
How about Arlo Guthrie's "Riding On The City Of New Orleans"? Steve Goodman wrote it but Arlo made it famous.
“Things of quality have no fear of time.”
I stumbled into this one while looking for something else on You Tube, a young musician called Mean Mary, and the song is "Iron Horse." And man, can she play that banjo!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CNB5OLUPM0
She must be pretty tough too, walkin' barefoot on that roadbed!
Louis Prima's version of "That Old Black Magic" is great but listen to this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5KYW441M4g
Spike was the man!
Rainy Night in Georgia. Brooke Benton. Just a mention literally, but the "scene" of the song is at a depot or yard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDRbF80NKDU
Still in training.
It's a brief, and somewhat obscure mention, and it is the subways that are mentioned, but Simon and Garfunkels "Sounds of Silence."
Another of their lesser known songs, "Poem on the Underground Wall," has as it's first line: "The last train is nearly due..."
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
HOW ABOUT : Fireball Mail by the Osborne Bros
@ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ksixgx_mFE
Or some Boxcar Willie: Wabash Cannonball
@https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPnciunYwHg
Maybe some Johnnie Cash: Orange Blossom Special [witrh some of those English train photos(?) ] @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4-uoUpN1c4
or even some more Johnnie Cash: I've got a thing about trains
@ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dj33mYjjRPY
Can't forget The Godfather of Soul.
Take the A Train
Asleep at the Wheel has a great version of Choo Choo Ch'Boogie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZM3_noPyiU
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Rock Island Line:
"Mother's Lying in a Box in the Baggage Coach Ahead" (no recording available). Also, "Hey Engineer, is this Train Goin' South" (novelty piece about New Jersey - several dixieland band recordings).
There's also the "Great Crush Collision March", a novelty piece (without words) wrriten to "commemorate" the staged train wreck arranged by William Crush, General Passenger Agent of the MKT, which ended up killing a number of people when the boilers of the colliding trains exploded. The reason this piece of of some note is that is is one of the earliest published works of Scott Joplin, the famous ragtime composer. The sheet music version is not a rag, but it was undoubtedly played as a rag.
Soul Asylum, Runaway Train:
Joe Bataan, Subway Joe:
Modeling the Pennsylvania Railroad in N Scale.
www.prr-nscale.blogspot.com
Not specifically what is defined as "popular music," but still very popular with many railfans and professionals is the bulk of J .S. Bach's organ music.
It is now free! All of it. Go to
smdt.umich.edu/bachorgan
and donwload and then enjoy, any time.
James Kibbie on historic German organs
zardoz Gordon Lightfoot's Canadian Railroad Trilogy.
Gordon Lightfoot's Canadian Railroad Trilogy.
+1
Pierre Berton once said to Lightfoot: "You know, Gord, you said as much in that song as I said in my book", referring to his 1000+ pages of The National Dream and The Last Spike.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
If he can use Paul Whiteman, then I can use this
Swingabella also has a good version of this, and perhaps unsurprisingly Manhattan Transfer has a version done ‘their way’...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rva7-DEyQ9A
goldspike 1 The Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe - Johnny Mercer
The Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe - Johnny Mercer
One of the greatest lyricists among the Great American Songbook crowd.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/fats-domino-full-episode/6753/
"Last Train to Clarksville" by the Monkees. Don't know the title, but there was a country song with a line that went "I'd rather be in a pine box on a slow train back to Georgia."
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