There’s an album by Stephen Emmer, Recitement, that sets narration to music, including a rumination on the glamour and romance of train travel recited by Lou Reed, an invocation of the myriad things that can happen on a train.
A good meal, a visit from card players, a night’s sleep… The author of this engaging book, Spencer Vignes, doesn’t mention that track, but it sums up much of what he’s writing about in his survey of the way the train has informed the narrative of so many songs.
We might think that the automobile is popular music’s transport of choice, but Springsteen invokes the melancholic whistle of the Downbound Train as succinctly as he writes about driving the turnpike. The train’s rhythm and imagery runs through the 20th century’s music: from the delta-blues musicians’ songs of boxcar hobos; to dancefloor fillers such as The Loco-Motion: soundscape carvings; Kraftwerk’s Trans-Europe Express; and onto more recent compositions, for instance The KLF’s Last Train To Transcentral, even if use of that imagery has faded in recent times.
Trains inhabit the beat of our songs, their allegorical thrust, and the imagery that described them in cinematic promo videos. Try reading this book’s write-up of The The’s Slow Train To Dawn without seeking out the associated film; indeed, when following Vignes’ accounts of the multitude of train-inspired songs, there’s a constant urge to track down the associated track. Evocative and passionate, it’s a lovely idea, neatly executed.
Preview, stream, download or buy Recitement on CD here.
