Tag: Chicago

A Train Can’t Bring Me Home

March 2, 2020 / C R Burgan

“Well I broke down in East St. Louis, on the Kansas City line
Drunk up all my money that I borrowed every time
And I fell down at the derby, the night’s black as a crow
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Thomas A. Waits) © Audiam, Inc

In the late 1980s – early 1990s I was working a job in the Coachella Valley of Southern California. My place of employment was almost exactly 50 miles from my home. Having been given by a friend a homemade cassette tape that included Tom Waits’ Small Change on one side, and Swordfish Trombones on the other, I had discovered that if I began the Small Change (total length of album: 48 min, 29 sec) side of the tape just as I was departing work, the album’s final song, “I Can’t Wait to Get Off Work”, would be playing as I entered my driveway and parked in front of my garage. This soon became a weekly ritual for me; my “TGIF” celebration as I drove home, paycheck in hand, leaving my job and workweek behind for a couple of days.

Small Change was Tom Waits’ third studio album. Recorded direct to two-track stereo tape in July 1976, and released later that same year, the album’s eleven tracks featured some of Waits’ best lyrical work to date. With Waits on piano and vocals, the album included the talents of Shelly Manne on drums, Jim Hughart on bass, and some delectable tenor saxophone work from the legendary Lew Tabackin. Along with a number of brilliant string arrangements by Jerry Yester, the release has been described as “beatnik-glory-meets-Hollywood-noir”.

Even someone with only a passing familiarity with the music of Tom Waits would likely agree that he is not the easiest of artists to sing along with. I’ve learned that for me the pursuit typically results in a sore throat. So, my Friday afternoon drive time was spent listening to Tom’s philosophical ruminations of urban life’s seamier side, as I contemplated my impending weekend. It wasn’t long before my weekly immersion in Small Change, led me to wade deeper into Waits’ catalog of recordings.

Although Small Change doesn’t really include any direct references to trains, it didn’t take long for me to recognize that trains & rail travel are familiar imagery in Tom Waits’ lyrical compositions. Not only has he penned songs dealing specifically with trains (e.g., “Train Song”, “Downtown Train”, “2:19”), but many of his songs include one or more lines referring to trains and/or traveling by rail.

In fact, further sleuthing led to an internet site listing more than 40 of Waits’ songs that contain references to trains, including:

“I come into town on a night train with an arm full of boxcar/ On the wings of a magpie cross a hooligan night” – Whistlin’ Past the Graveyard (Blue Valentine)

“Just put a church key in your pocket we’ll hop that freight train in the hall / We’ll slide all the way down the drain to New Orleans in the fall” – Kentucky Avenue (Blue Valentine)

“He went down, down, down and the devil called him by name / He went down, down, down hangin’ onto the back of a train” – Down, Down, Down (Swordfish Trombones)

“And they all pretend they’re Orphans and their memory’s like a train / You can see it getting smaller as it pulls away” – Time (Rain Dogs)

“I lived on nothing but dreams and train smoke” – Pony (Mule Variations)

Trains have been featured in popular music for as long as trains have existed. Sometimes the reference is literal, but often the train is used in a metaphorical sense. Train travel can signify deliverance, or transportation to a better life. The depiction of a locomotive barreling under a full head of steam may suggest loss of control. And there is likely no confusion what the railroad term “sidetracked” implies when used as a figure of speech.

Train imagery can also indicate transience. A quick perusal of Tom Waits’ life may find evidence of a significant amount of roving, and plainly his songs are populated by vagabonds and wanderers, whether autobiographical or otherwise. Waits once stated, “I don’t like the stigma that comes with being called a poet– so I call what I’m doing an improvisational adventure or an inebriational travelogue, and all of a sudden it takes on a whole new form and meaning”.

“What made my dreams so hollow, was standing at the depot
With a steeple full of swallows that could never ring the bell
And I’ve come ten thousand miles away, not one thing to show
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Waits)

“A steeple full of swallows that could never ring the bell”, is a favorite line from Waits’ “Train Song”.

The song appears on his ninth studio album, Frank’s Wild Years, which is a collection of songs written for a play of the same name, and released in 1987. Waits starred as the eponymous lead character, Frank, for a three-month period in 1985, when the play was produced by Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theater Company.

While I’m not absolutely clear on the play’s plot, “Train Song” appears near the end of the album’s side two, which makes the song’s final repeated line, “It was a train that took me away from here/ But a train can’t bring me home”, somewhat telling.

Many of Tom Waits’ songs – diehard fans may consider this blasphemy – often sound better when recorded by other artists. That being said, my favorite recording of “Train Song” is a live rendition by Canadian singer Holly Cole, recorded in Montreal and released on Cole’s 1996 album, It Happened One Night. Guitarist Kevin Breit uses his instrument to create train sound effects that, along with David Piltch’s throbbing bass and the spare percussion parts, lend Waits’ classic train song a haunting, ethereal quality.

Not that Tom’s version of the song doesn’t possess a haunting and ethereal quality of its own. It absolutely does, and I would not take anything away from his original recording. But as a lover of music and song, I appreciate being able to enjoy further interpretations of an artist’s work. On that subject, I believe that I will in a future blog post, shine the spotlight on another of Waits’ train songs, recorded by a number of different artists.

Until then . . .

“I remember when I left without bothering to pack
Don’t you know I up and left with just the clothes I had on my back
Now I’m sorry for what I’ve done and I’m out here on my own
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can’t bring me home” – Train Song (Waits)

Sources:

http://www.tomwaitsfan.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8993

http://www.tomwaits.com/wit/

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

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

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Change_(Tom_Waits_album)

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

You Don’t Need No Ticket

December 9, 2019 / C R Burgan

“People get ready
For the train to Jordan
Picking up passengers
From coast to coast” – People Get Ready (Mayfield) © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner/Chappell Music

“In the slave period here, one of the things that was prominent was the song – how the songs extolled the glory of God . . . You know that. They needed it. Some people were so low that they had to look up to see the ground. Where were they living? On the other side of the tracks. But what will God do? God will build a bridge over the tracks for me to get across”. – Rev Earnest Palmer – Deep South, by Paul Theroux

Curtis Mayfield was born on June 3, 1942 in Chicago, Illinois. One of five children, Mayfield’s father left the family when Curtis was five. His mother (and maternal grandmother) moved the family into several Chicago public housing projects before settling into Cabrini–Green during his teen years. His mother taught him to play piano, and he was encouraged by his mother and grandmother to embrace gospel music. One of his earliest experiences performing was with the Northern Jubilee Gospel Singers at this aunt’s church.

In 1956, Mayfield joined his high school friend Jerry Butler’s group, The Roosters, to which he contributed his own original compositions. Two years later the group became The Impressions. With a varying lineup of members, The Impressions had a number of hits in the early 1960s, including their recording of “Amen”, an updated version of the old gospel tune, which was included on the soundtrack of the Sidney Poitier film, Lilies of the Field. The Impressions would reach the height of their popularity in the mid–to- late 60s with a string of Mayfield compositions that included “Keep On Pushing”, “It’s All Right”, the up-tempo “Talking about My Baby”, “Woman’s Got Soul” and “People Get Ready”.

“People, get ready
There’s a train a-coming
You don’t need no baggage
You just get on board” – People Get Ready (Mayfield)

“People Get Ready”, the title track of The Impressions’ album, People Get Ready, eventually became the group’s biggest hit. Released in 1965, it peaked at number 3 on the Billboard R&B Chart and number 14 on the Billboard Pop Chart. Mayfield said he originally wrote the song in response to both the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and the deadly church bombing of Bloody Sunday in Birmingham. Martin Luther King Jr. chose “People Get Ready” as the unofficial anthem of the Civil Rights Movement and often used the song to get people marching or to calm and comfort them.

Robert F. Darden, a contributor to the Dallas News, comments about Mayfield’s song: “The allusion to the railroad is no accident. It immediately resonates not just with the spirituals, but with older blues songs as well, where references to trains quickly show up in the lyrics. A host of writers have noted, during the Civil War and Reconstruction, railroads still evoked awe and wonder among African Americans in the South. The unofficial pathways to freedom in the North were called the Underground Railroad, where passengers were summoned by the spiritual ‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot’. And when freedom did come, those still-magical vehicles enabled the formerly enslaved people to join in the Great Migration north”.

“All you need is faith
To hear the diesels humming
Don’t need no ticket
You just thank the Lord” – People Get Ready (Mayfield)

According to Curtis Mayfield’s son Todd, their ancestors had been enslaved in Louisiana and carried their stories with them on the Illinois Central Railroad to the South Side projects of Chicago. Mayfield’s grandmother, Annie Bell, was a devoutly religious woman and encouraged her grandson’s love of music, especially gospel. Mayfield himself says that “People Get Ready” probably came from the subconscious “preachings of my grandmothers and most ministers when they reflect from the Bible.”

Social commentator Juan Williams has been quoted as saying, “The train that is coming in the song speaks to a chance for redemption – the long sought chance to rise above racism, to stand apart from despair and any desire for retaliation – an end to the cycle of pain.”

Music critic Stanley Crouch wrote, “by saying, ‘There’s a train a-comin’, get ready,’ that was like saying, OK, so regardless of what happens, get yourself together for this because you are going to get a chance. Your chance is coming.”

“Faith is the key
Open the doors and board them
There’s hope for all
Among those loved the most” – People Get Ready (Mayfield)

Robert F. Darden also writes, “’People Get Ready’ has been interpreted as both an allusion to the religious apocalypse known as the second coming in many Christian denominations and as a warning to those who oppose equality and civil rights in the modern day. And, as is the case with the best songwriters, both interpretations can be right”.

“There ain’t no room
For the hopeless sinner
Who would hurt all mankind
Just to save his own

“Have pity on those
Whose chances are thinner
‘Cause there’s no hiding place
From the kingdom’s throne” – People Get Ready (Mayfield)

Curtis Mayfield’s song has stood the test of time. In 2000 it was chosen by a panel of 20 songwriters – including Paul McCartney and Brian Wilson – as among the top 10 songs of all time. They ranked it at number nine. In 2004, Rolling Stone placed it at number 24 in its 500 greatest hits of all time, and also placed it at number 20 on their list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Tracks. The song was included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. “People Get Ready” was named as one of the Top 10 Best Songs of All Time by Mojo music magazine, and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2016, the song was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry due to its “cultural, historic, or artistic significance”. It has been recorded and performed by dozens of artists.

Singer Curtis Mayfield (L) poses with the first annual Soul Train Quincy Jones Award for outstanding career achievement. /Photo by Fred Prouser REUTERS REUTERS

In August 1990, Curtis Mayfield was injured when lighting equipment fell on him during an outdoor concert in Brooklyn. Paralyzed from the neck down, and no longer able to play the guitar, he continued composing, singing and recording music. He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995 and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in of March 1999. He died from complications of type 2 diabetes on December 26, 1999.

Todd Mayfield, who is his father’s biographer, writes, “Though he isn’t here, my father is still part of that fight. His music speaks as powerfully to the times we live in as it did to his own. His songs remain vital, uncompromising, and true. His message endures — a message he refused to abandon even in the darkest of times. If he were alive today, he’d urge us to keep on pushing, to never give up, to get ready for something better. He wouldn’t be able to help himself.”

“So people get ready
For the train a-comin‘
You don’t need no ticket
You just get on board” – People Get Ready (Mayfield) © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner/Chappell Music

Sources:

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

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

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_(music)

https://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/brown/folkexpression.htm –

https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2015/08/folklore-of-trains-in-usa-part-two/

https://www.hopechannel.com/au/read/people-get-ready

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author.

Good Mornin’ America

November 11, 2019 / C R Burgan

“Riding on the city of New Orleans
Illinois Central, Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders
Three conductors, twenty-five sacks of mail” – City of New Orleans (Steve Goodman) © Sony/ATV Music

The story goes that in 1970 Arlo Guthrie was doing five shows a night at the Quiet Knight bar in Chicago when he was approached by an unknown songwriter who asked if Guthrie would listen to his songs. Guthrie replied that if the man would buy him a beer he would listen just as long as it took him to finish that beer. The song that caught his attention that night was about a train.

When Arlo admitted that he liked the tune, the author begged him to, “give that one to Johnny Cash for me.” But claiming that Cash wasn’t interested in it, Guthrie went on to record “City of New Orleans” for himself in 1972 and peaking at #4 on the Billboard Easy Listening chart and #18 on the Hot 100 chart, it would prove to be Guthrie’s only top-40 hit.

“All along the southbound odyssey
The train pulls out at Kankakee
Rolls along past houses, farms, and fields” – City of New Orleans (Goodman)

“City Of New Orleans” was composed by Chicago singer-songwriter Steve Goodman in 1970. While traveling to visit his wife’s grandmother, he noted the things that he saw outside his carriage window, jotting down notes as his wife slept during the journey. Everything that he described in the song’s lyrics actually happened during the train ride.

City of New Orleans - Illinois Central Railroad

When he returned home he learned that the eponymous train on which he had ridden, operated by Illinois Central Railroad, was scheduled to be decommissioned due to lack of riders. Feeling encouraged to use his song in an effort to save the train, he polished the tune and recorded it for his debut album in 1971.

City of New Orleans, by Steve Goodman. Buddah Records label.

“Passin’ trains that have no names
Freight yards full of old black men
And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles” – City of New Orleans (Goodman)

City of New Orleans train route map. — City of New Orleans route

Illinois Central Railroad had begun operating the City of New Orleans in April 1947. The overnight train had the longest regularly scheduled route in the country for a time; carrying passengers from Chicago, Illinois, through the heartland of the country, and down to New Orleans, Louisiana. With declining ridership due to competition from automobile and airplane travel, the route soon went the way of so many famed lines of the 20^th Century. In May 1971, Amtrak assumed operation of US train passenger service. The City of New Orleans was then converted to a nighttime route and renamed the Panama Limited.

“Good morning America how are you?
Don’t you know me I’m your native son
I’m the train they call The City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone five hundred miles when the day is done” – City of New Orleans (Goodman)

While Goodman’s recording of his own song found moderate success, it was Guthrie’s version that popularized the refrain, “Good Morning America, how are ya?” When ABC television launched a new morning show in 1975, they called it: Good Morning America, and due to the popularity of the song during the 1970s, Amtrak chose to capitalize on the recognition, renaming the route City of New Orleans in 1981.

City of New Orleans, by Arlo Guthrie. Reprise Records label.

Steve Goodman died on September 20, 1984, at the age of 36 after a long battle with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Also that year Willie Nelson covered “City of New Orleans”, making it the title track of his album. Nelson’s version was a #1 Country hit and won the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. Being a songwriting category, the Grammy was posthumously awarded to Goodman.

“And the sons of Pullman porters
And the sons of engineers
Ride their father’s magic carpet made of steel
Mothers with their babes asleep
Rockin’ to the gentle beat
And the rhythm of the rails is all they feel” – City of New Orleans (Goodman)

A number of years ago I had the opportunity to work security at an Arlo Guthrie show being presented at Peninsula Temple Beth El, in San Mateo, California. This was a small, intimate setting for Arlo & his band, which was largely comprised of his family members. They performed within the sanctuary to a packed house. Although my main responsibility was to keep watch around the property’s perimeter, and parking area, I tried to at least be inside for a portion of the show.

Arlo Guthrie picture as an older man. — Arlo Guthrie

I couldn’t claim to have a vast knowledge of Guthrie’s music, nor had I ever seen him perform previously, but “City of New Orleans”, and specifically his recording of the song, had long been a favorite train song of mine; probably my favorite train song.

Knowing that this song would likely be performed towards the end of the show I took an opportunity to quietly steal in through a rear entrance. I couldn’t see much, but I could hear. And what I heard was rapt silence, as the singer and consummate performer held the audience in the palm of his hand. He prefaced the song he had made famous – his sole top-40 hit – by saying that he had once been admonished that every great folk singer needs a train song in his repertoire and this one he had adopted as his. The song was well received by the audience who responded with thunderous applause, as I returned to perimeter duty, having witnessed a seasoned song man & story-teller deliver a rousing rendition of a song with which he had become indelibly connected, and that he had truly made his own.

“Goodnight, America . . .

This train’s got the disappearing railroad blues” – City of New Orleans (Goodman)

City of New Orleans, by Arlo Guthrie; 45 rpm sleeve — Arlo Guthrie 45 rpm sleeve

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_New_Orleans_(song)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_New_Orleans_(train)

https://www.arloguthrie.com/about

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

http://www.stevegoodman.net/bio.html

All photos sourced through internet searches, none belong to the author