The Train Kept A-Rollin'

The Train Kept A-Rollin'.....most likely this song has one of several identities to you depending on your age and where you are located, or it means nothing at all. What makes the song interesting is its beginnings as a rhythm song (as in rhythm & blues....they were two different things, not one) followed by a 50's rockabilly screamer to a 60's British beat song then into a hard rock song. Many people have recorded the song in the past 45 years, but featured below are the cornerstone recordings on which all the many other versions are built upon.

The Train Kept A-Rollin' was co-written and first recorded by Myron "Tiny" Bradshaw and his orchestra on July 25, 1951. Tiny had been a band leader and vocalist and appearing on records since around 1944, but his recording susccess took a giant step when he signed with Cincinnati's King Records in 1949. Knock on wood, I've always had a very healthy blood pressure level, but one thing that makes it rise is to hear or read something about rock 'n' roll being 'invented' in 1955. Nothing could be further from the truth and Tiny Bradshaw is one of many people rockin' long before 1955.
This original recording, done in Cincinnati at King's studio, also features Wilbur "Red" Prysock on tenor sax. In the later 50's when sax played a major roll in rock 'n' roll, Red Prysock was one of the top honkers.

 

The Rock and Roll Trio, sometimes called the Johnny Burnette Trio, consisted of brothers Dorsey and Johnny Burnette and Paul Burlison. Dorsey and Paul worked for Crown Electric in Memphis (as did Elvis Presley) by day and played hillbilly bop on the weekends. In the winter of 1956, Paul and Dorsey were laid off from their jobs and they decided to relocate to New York City in hope of finding work through the electrician's union. Johnny went along as well and found work in the Garment District and they lived at a YMCA. They auditioned for ABC's Ted Mack's Original Amateur Hour TV show, were successful getting on the show and won three straight weeks that Spring which gave them a slot in the finals in September and also provided them with huge national exposure. The big record companies were soon vying to sign them to a contract. They ended up signing with Coral, a subsidiary of Decca, and first entered the Decca studio in New York to record on May 7, 1956. With their first Coral single out, which hit in a few markets but not nationally, they made appearances on a lot of the big TV variety shows including American Bandstand and the Tonight Show. With more recorded material needed, they did their second session at Owen Bradley's Studio in Nashville over 4 days in the first week of July. The Train Kept A-Rollin' was one of the songs recorded and it was released as their third single Oct. 13 backed with a cover of Big Joe Turner's 1953 song Honey Hush. Like the two records previous to that, it failed to make the national charts and the trio made a living from their live performances of grueling one-night stands. Tensions built and one night in Niagara Falls that Autumn a fight broke out and Dorsey left the band. Both Johnny and Dorsey went on to solo singing careers and in short time Paul Burlison was back in Memphis running his own electrical subcontracting business. Johnny had a big pop hit in 1960 with You're Sixteen and Dorsey had a hit with Tall Oak Tree that same year. In the meantime, the Coral recordings were pretty much buried and forgotten as rock & roll marched on. But what about their recording of this song? What inspired them to take Tiny's bouncy ode to a "hipster, gone dame" and turn it into a driving rockabilly screamer seems to be lost to time. With Johnny's frantic vocals and Paul Burlison's screaching over-amplified Fender guitar with the treble set at 10, helped along by Buddy Harmon's steady drum, that song (as well as a number of their other 1956 recordings) were not hits and perhaps too far ahead of their time. 

 

Time passes. It's the late 50's / early 60's and Corporate America has decided "rock and roll has got to go!" A lot of great music was still getting recorded, but on the radio what people heard was only "nice" music. Over in the UK, rock and roll was not dead. A lot of American rockers could still make a living there. What was dead in the UK was radio, but the British young people sought out all the American rock and roll singles they could get their hands on. They formed clubs and appreciation groups and featured much cherished records at community dances and so on. Rocking songs that were totally obscure and unheard of in the US became popular items in the UK and inspired many of them to take up instruments and perform the songs themselves while in America people were listening to Rubber Ball (bouncy bouncy), Venus, Oh Carol, Volare, Itsy Bitsy Bikini......."nice" music. Black American musicians, such as those found on Chicago's Chess, Chief and Vee Jay Records, made a living playing the so-called chitlin' circuit, playing in small clubs in the eastern states, many in the still segregated South. A lot of these acts were brought to England, and other European countries, in the late 50's and suddenly found themselves playing in front of well-dressed white audiences who politely listened and enthusiastically applauded their every song. These performances made a huge impact on aspiring British musicians. I believe I once read how a young Mick Jagger and Keith Richards had an epiphany moment watching Rosetta Tharpe perform.
When the Beatles first went to the US their first stop was in Washington DC where they gave interviews and politely answered slews of really stupid questions. At one point Paul McCartney asked an interviewer what he thought of the music of Muddy Waters and the reply was "who is Muddy Waters?" McCartney replied with something about Americans don't even know who their own famous people are. That pretty much sums up the situation at that time.
Anyway, one group of young musicians were very taken with the electric blues as issued by Chess Records, etc. and formed a band called The Yardbirds in May 1963. Their original guitarist, Top Topham, was replaced by a guy named Eric Clapton that October. The Yardbirds became a successful band playing clubs in the greater London area and with some records under their belt began to branch out in England, but with success and contracts comes demands and to maintain viability they had to alter their sound more in a beat group pop direction. Clapton, a blues purist, left in early March 1965 rather than compromise his talents. He was replaced by Jeff Beck. Just before Clapton departed, and perhaps what led him to depart, the band recorded Graham Gouldman's For Your Love which became a hit and also exposed them to the huge American market. That September they finally made it to the USA, but something with their work permits was amiss and that prevented them from performing most of their schedule shows. They did take advantage of being there though and visited some of the legendary (to them) recording studios such as Sam Phillips in Memphis and Chess in Chicago. While in Memphis (the home of the Rock and Roll Trio), Sept. 12, 1965, they recorded (perhaps in tribute?) The Train Kept A-Rollin' and Mr. You're A Better Man Than I (which became a hit for them). The same week they visited Chess in Chicago and paid tribute to Bo Diddley by recording I'm A Man and also another song that became a hit for them, Shapes Of Things. The Yardbirds recording of Train was purely inspired by the 1956 Rock and Roll Trio recording yet also took it in another direction.
Beck opened it making a train whistle sound on his guitar and at one point during a break Jim McCarty drums a few clickety-clack bars. In the end, their recording introduced the song to a new genre and a new generation.

 

Beck was dismissed from The Yardbirds in later 1966 and was replaced by session wizard Jimmy Page. In late March 1968, not very long before the band called it quits, they performed at the Anderson Theater in New York City and opened with Train. Here you can listen to Page's take on the song. This is noteworthy because as soon as The Yardbirds packed it in, Page started a new band called The New Yardbirds which was shortly changed to Led Zeppelin and the first song they ever played was The Train Kept A-Rollin'.

 

By this point, Train Kept A-Rollin' was being recorded by a lot of acts and was being played by even more. It became a rock staple right up there with Gloria. In 1974 Aerosmith recorded the song, Joe Perry being a big fan of Jeff Beck, and the song was introduced to another generation of music and taking it, in 23 short years, from Tiny Bradshaw's jump & shout to a hard rocking classic that remains popular all these years later.