The Steel Wheels Coming to Town

If you are fortunate enough to live in or near Marlinton in Pocahontas County, WV, make your way to the Opera House this Saturday, November 12 to see The Steel Wheels in concert at 7:30 pm.  I’ll be there!  I’ve been a fan of these guys for a while now, but this is the first chance I’m getting to see them live.  I can’t wait.  I learned about them from Bicycle Times magazine’s June 2010 issue which reported on their  pedal-powered, seven night, concert tour.  They strapped their instruments and merchandise to their bikes and headed from town to town, covering nearly 300 miles.  This wasn’t some stunt, followed by a support vehicle in case they got tired and needed a lift; this was a genuine concert tour on bicycles.  In fact, they did another this year.  As I read I learned that they were based in Harrisonburg, VA, a place I knew well having gone to James Madison University for my first two years of college.

Those two things alone were reason enough reason to like these guys.  They hail from Virginia, and they tour by bicycle.  (Not always, of course.  They have a national following, and a bicycle tour across the entire country is impractical, at best.)

They were praiseworthy, but were they any good?  Now I had yet to check out the music.

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This One, At Least, Is Short. Another Train Song List

"Long Black Train, by cindy47452

A while back I posted a couple lists of train songs. Then I stumbled across one of those songs about train songs. Finally, only about a week ago, taking into consideration suggestions that had continued to come in, I posted a new revised list. I thought for sure that would be it. Of course not. Here, dear reader, is yet another list.

Share More train songs

The vast majority of train songs I’ve found are Country and Blues songs. But all of the lists include songs from many different genres, and that is true here, too. The first song is Barry Manilow‘s Border Train, and it is a typical Manilow ballad. That’s followed by Sarah McLachlan‘s Train Wreck, again typical McLachlan’s. Neither of those tunes is exactly crossover material, at least not as recorded here, and they are not country.

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More Train Songs

Almost exactly a month ago I posted a list of Train Songs, but I did so too early. I had asked the help of friends in Lost HighwayRecords Fancorps. They reminded me of lots of songs I had forgotten and even more that I didn’t yet know. They also introduced me to Jimmie Rodgers, The Singin’ Brakeman. A few suggests came in from other places, too.

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who contributed. This was fun. I may just take SlowMovinOutlaw up on his suggestion and do another list on another theme. He suggested trucking songs. Maybe, though I don’t know how much that crosses genres. I found train songs that were Country, Rock, Jazz, Blues, Folk, Soul… They’re all here.
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Train Songs-Two Lists

Regular readers of this blog, follows of my twitter feed, and all my friends are aware that I’ve been collecting train songs for a few weeks. I wanted to post the list before National Train Day on May 8, 2010, but I didn’t get it posted. But here they are now, in two versions. Neither Rhapsody or iTunes has all the songs I need for the list, but between the two of them, I have almost nearly all the songs. There’s some overlap.  Thanks to everyone who sent me suggestions.  If you have more, keep them coming.  Let me know the song and where you heard it or why you like it. Let me know what you think of these lists, too.

Train Songs

Here’s the Rhapsody List.
Train Songs

  1. Play A Train Song  Todd Snider
  2. City Of New Orleans  Steve Goodman
  3. Midnight Train to Georgia   Gladys Knight
  4. Chatanooga Choo Choo   Glenn Miller
  5. Last Train To Clarksville  Cassandra Wilson
  6. People Get Ready  Rod Stewart
  7. Take The “A” Train  Ella Fitzgerald
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Sunday Morning Music

Every time that I put my iTunes list on random that I realize how large and diverse my iTunes library is.  Here is my list from this morning, rather mellow, purely by coincidence.  If there are songs you like a lot and want to check out the album, click on the links.  If you decide to purchase and do so through the link, a portion of your sales will benefit the Tangier American Legation Institute for Moroccan Studies.

1) Underneath Your Clothes – One of the songs in English recorded by the Colombian (of Lebanese descent) superstar singer-songwriter Shakira. It’s from her album Laundry Service, and has an interesting lyric. While best know for he hip-shaking dance music (Hips Don’t Lie is probably her biggest American hit to date), Shakira rich, full voice is beautiful on ballads as well.

2) Bitter End – This is from the Dixie Chick’s award winning album Taking the Long Way, their first since the controversy over their 2003 comments in London about George Bush and the one that included the hit “Not Ready to Make Nice.”

3) Life Support – From Damn the TorpedoesTom Petty tune on her Greatest Hits: The Road Less Traveled.

5) Bismillah – Tinariwen play Rock and Roll Mali style. The title of this song, translated, is “in the name of God,” and it is from the album Mataraden Anexan.

6) Another Pot O’ Tea – I found this track on Anthology: The Warner/Reprise Years. Emmylou’s distinctive, plaintiff voice is just beautiful.

7) Hell is for Children – One of my favorite artists of the 1980’s, Pat Benatar, had a hit with this angry song about child abuse.

8) The Nearness of You – As you can see on this link,Lino Patruno has many talents. But here it is a band leader and performer performing this great standard by Hoagy Carmichael. It is from the album It Had To Be You.

9) Gold Rush Brides – 10,000 Maniacs. The performance that came up on my iPhone today was from MTV Unplugged. As the title suggests, the song is about the wives of the men who went west in the California Gold Rush.

10) Big Day – There is a lot of flashback music here. This XTC song is from the album Skylarking and it takes me back to my college days.

11) Ntssana Rjouak – Well this was a surprise. I didn’t think I would find this Amazon, but I did. The song is called “I’ll Wait for Your Return” and it’s from Saida Fikri’s second album, released in 1995, called Salouni Al’adab. Saida Fikri is a Moroccan singer/songwriter who mixes genres and cultural traditions.

12) Who Needs the Kwik E Mart? – Hit and Run Bluegrass are the kind of band you really just need to check out so click on the link above and see their site. Here they perform the song that the Simpsons sang to cheer up Apu when he lost his job at the Kwik E Mart in that obscure animated TV series The Simpsons. The album is called Four Finger Music: The Bluegrass Tribute to the Music Made Famous By the Simpsons.

I’ve made an iMix with this and other music, so you can hear samples and so you can buy the songs easily. If you want the whole albums, however, use the links above and, as I mentioned, you will be helping support the Tangier American Legation Institute for Moroccan Studies.

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