In your opinion, what is the best songs ever written about the railroads?

There’s two of them in my oppinion:

First and foremost: “O Poor Paddy, Work Upon The Railway”

Lyrics:
O, in eighteen hundred and forty one,
My corduroy breeches I put on,
My time was nearly done,
To work upon the railway, the railway,
Im weary of the railway,
O, poor Paddy work on the railway.
2. O, in eighteen hundred and forty two,
My corduroy breeches then were new,
I did not know what I should do.
To work upon the railway, the railway,
Im weary of the railway,
O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  1. O, in eighteen hundred and forty three,
    I sailed away across the sea,
    I sailed away to Amerikee.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,
    Im weary of the railway,
    O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  2. O, in eighteen hundred and forty four,
    I landed on the Columbia shore,
    I had a pick-ax and nothing more.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,
    Im weary of the railway,
    O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  3. O, in eighteen hundred and forty five,
    When Dan O’Connelly was still alive,
    I worked in a railway hive.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,
    Im weary of the railway,
    O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  4. O, in eighteen hundred and forty six,
    I found myself in a hell of a fix;
    I changed my job to toting bricks.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,
    Im weary of the railway,
    O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  5. O, in eighteen hundred and forty seven,
    When Dan O’Connelly went to heaven,
    Little Paddy was going on eleven.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,
    Im weary of the railway,
    O, poor Paddy work on the railway.

  6. O, in eighteen hundred and forty eight,
    I found myself bound for the Golden Gate,
    Gold was found in the western state.
    To work upon the railway, the railway,

Anything Boxcar Willie, City NO by Nelson, Hey Porter and the Rock Island Line by Cash. Years ago on the Sun night Bluegrass hr on KFDI 1070 AM in Wichita,KS there was a song about the Rock Island but do not know the title or who sang it.

John Denver’s version of “City of New Orleans”
I’m surprised that wasn’t mentioned,along with all his other railroad
songs he performed.

Hate to be a nitpicker, but “Train Train” was Blackfoot. “Railroad Song” by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Grand Funk RAILROAD’s version of “The Loco-Motion.” Don’t know if these count as the “best ever” but hey let’s add them anyway. I can go along with almost everything else on here.

The Willie Nelson version of “City of New Orleans”.

I think Willies vocal profile just adds to the song.

“Petticoat Junction”

All the songs on John Denver’s All Aboard! cd, especially:

Daddy, What’s a Train?
Jennie Dreamed of Trains
Steel Rails
Waiting for a Train

No one has heard of Utah Phillips? How about his song “Daddy, What’s a Train”? He has an album of railroad and train songs. His album called “Good though” is live with some nice stage banter, including, “My golly, this is moose tu*d pie! Sure is good though.” You can find his CD’s commercially if you look hard enough in the folk sections of CD/record stores. If you cringe when exposed to any left leaning political and social commentary then these are not for you. If you like a lot of irreverence towards self centered people then you will enjoy.

The tribute to Steve Goodman CD has some great stories about Mr Goodman including how Arlo ended up singing the City or New Orleans. One of the best bottles of beer Arlo ever had…

Don’t know the song writer, nor the name of the singer, but…
On a copy of a VHS tape given me by a buddy, showing Dave McCormick’s Daylight on a trip through Oregon and Washington State, there is a song used as background , “Hear the Whistle Blow”…

Well done, good rhythm, and easy to listen to lyrics…

Any ideas who?
Would like to download it or get a CD if anyone knows…
Ed, or Eds, or us if you prefer…[:D]

Anybody ever hear Patsy Cline sing ; Mountain Railroad
Or how bout Ridin that New River train ?? Patsy didn’t sing that one .

[censored], you beat me to it.[(-D]

I had a 45 rpm record of train songs I got as a youth with a book which I subsequently lost and can’t remember the title. But the songs include:

Wabash Cannonball
Casey Jones
John Henry
something to the effect of “we work all day, no sugar in our tay (tea), workin’ on the U Pay railway”(?)

I know I still have it somewhere, wish I could find it, even if I have no record player to play it on.

Rock Island Line by the man in black

Can’t remember too much about it, but one of the female folksingers in our area had a musical tribute to the South Shore line (probably dates from the orange-car era).

But without a doubt, the best one is the City of New Orleans. And I don’t think anyone did it better than the writer, Steve Goodman. Call me a purist…

The best cd ever done with railroads as it’s sole theme was done by a folksinger by the name of Utah Phillips. This is the real deal.Interspersed between songs like Phoebe Snow, and Frisco Road are soundtracks. There is one track of NKP 759 that digitally sounds like a steam powered SR-71 blackbird going by at ground level.The title is Good Though!. Highly recommend it.

Hooray! KFDI! (http://www.kfdi.com/)

So many have done Rock Island: Johnny Horton, Johnny Cash… but a bluegrass version I would like to hear. I’ve also heard a Bluegrass version of City of New Orleans. Can’t remember their names. It was on Volume II of some all time Bluegrass thingy. I think the group was called ‘Seldom Herd’ or something.

Freight train , freight train goin’ so fast …artist unknown
On the Acthison, Topeka, and Santa Fe…Andrews sisters ???

In my opinion every song written about the railroads is a GREAT song! How many songs can you name about trucks, buses? There a couple out there, but there’s far more about trains and railroads.
How about this one…

Come all you rounders if you want to hear, story about a great engineer, Casey Jones was the rounders name on 6-8 wheeler boys he rode to fame.

I used to have a collection of old train songs that I taped from a special on NPR. I had 2 favorites but can’t remember the titles or all the lyrics, but here’s parts of them, maybe someone knows what they are;
Is that the moon I see
Over there in the west
Or just the headlight beam
? &O Express……
I know she’s gone
Whatever I say
It won’t be long
Till I make up my mind
And go away…
That poor old fool
Out on the trestle
He can’t go up
And he can’t go back
Train kept commin
Brushed him off the track

The California Central…….
who’s headlight beam shines on forever……
….can hear the whistle blow for – miles…
Pullin into Old ….

Anyone ? I’d really like to find that second one, haven’t heard it in so long.

I also like City Of N. O.- Arlo G.
Daddy what’s A Train
The L&N Don’t stop Here Anymore

Here’s a link to a page with a very good train song video. Just scroll down and hit on top title “Train” by Robert Bradley …
http://search.music.yahoo.com/search/?m=video&p=train&x=13&y=8