Transportation in American Rock Playlist

It occurred to me the actual music might help.

In talking to my mother (quite possibly the only person reading this, which is impressive, as she already has to listen to me go on about this crap on a daily basis) it occurred to me that the last post might have benefited from some more links to the actual music mentioned, so here you go.

When presented with numerous possible recordings of a given song, I have generally gone with the canonical version (and thus we have Arlo Guthrie’s “City of New Orleans” rather than Steve Goodman’s (Steve Goodman merits an entirely separate discussion that I may or may not get to in a later dispatch). I am of the opinion that it is not possible to choose a single definitive version of Johnny Cash singing “Folsom Prison Blues,” so for the sake of authenticity I went with the live version from Folsom Prison. I have also excluded several songs (notably “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” and “John Henry”) that I do not believe should be recorded, as they are songs that should only be sung in person, preferably out of tune (cue the Joni Mitchell line about “The Circle Game”).

Also notably missing is Ronnie Gilbert’s version of “Trouble in Mind,” which is not available on most streaming services (and which for many years was not even on YouTube, where you can find it now). The subject of which works of art are available to whom and in what formats is also a much, much larger topic for another day. Or really for my day job.

That’s all for now folks, as they say. Will there be more? Stay tuned.