Loaded like a Freight Train….
GNR fans will appreciate this story. I was coming home from one of those miserable days at work, when a cloud follows you from the office, to the stairwell, to the revolving door of your work building, creeps down the subway stairs like a horror-movie mist and stands beside you in the smelly underground world of the subway. (People, wise up-it is not a coincidence that you go underground like a troll every day to be barfed up an hour later onto the surface to enter a slave-master’s domain. Think you’re any different because your job is “helping the world”? Its slavery nevertheless and will stay that way until our world and its masters start respecting the holistic individual). I was waiting for the A train, when a middle aged man with dirty-blonde (in every sense) long hair clad in jeans (pants, jacket and shirt) started to stumble towards the benches where I was standing. The man was drunk; he was clutching his forty-ounce in a crumbled brown paper bag that reminded me of life at the corner bodega before plastic bags. He suddenly burst out in chorus, air guitar and all, to the lyrics of Nightrain, except he changed it to match the train he was waiting for. So goes his song:
Loaded like a freight train,
Flying like an aeroplane…
(pause)
I’m on the A train,
Bottom’s up!
I’m on the A train,
Fill my cup!
I’m on the A train,
Ready to crash and burn, I never learn…
I’m on the A train,
I love that stuff!
I’m on the A train,
And I can never get enough!
I’m on the A train,
Never to return!
I found it very humorous, and it did add a smile to my journey home. I had to hold myself back from joining him in song because I do know the lyrics and appreciated his spirit… I changed my mind when his attention turned to singing about my legs.
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That reminds me of one guy who I used to run into on the subway around 1am on the way from my gigs in the Village. This guy had a monkey on his shoulder and a saxophone. Upon entering he would say: “Ladies and gentleman, my name is ______ and now I am going to give you an over-dose of my talent” and…..he was 100% correct. It was an over-dose in volume and enormous “talent” in producing countless sounds and riffs none of which was fit for human ear. We gave him cash just so he would get off asap. BTW, one of his “tunes” might have been about my legs but I couldn’t decipher (when will this site have a spell check) any pitches or rhythmic patterns necessary to perform musical analysis.
that’s a great story! very funny intro he had.
I know, I gotta work on updating the comment options- it’s a learning process! at least it underlines it for you when it’s mispelled (like right now), but then you’re on your own.
A Train song is classic! See that is a constant inner battle… you innocently displayed your facial expression which was reflective of your feelings and the humor that you found in this guys rendition of Nighttrain but then your bashful half smile ends up being an invitation for the interaction to become personal. Granted this potential nutjob who was intoxicated probably was only able to sing about your fabulous legs because that is all he could see after a bottle of grain alcohol. Ever get to a point where you “accidentally” get so drunk that you can only see down? Not fun. It is hard when you are a light weigh because that extra drink could be the cause.
JPLogan, does this “entertainer” still exist? I would love to catch his performance. Did he think just because he threw a monkey into the mix that it would cover up his inabilities?
Has anyone had the pleasure of listening to the gentlemen who sits and plays the Chinese String instrument at Columbus Circle? Poor guy is completely tone def and pleasures the crowd with songs played on his un-tuned instrument. It is pretty awful but I think he does not hear well because he wheres a hearing aide in one ear… so the poor guy could potentially be an excellent musician but he can’t hear what he sounds like!
OH, that guy drives me crazy! I run away to the other end of the track when I hear him, it’s so bad… There is another fellow who is the opposite spectrum who sings soulful songs-I sometimes listen to him for 15 minutes missing my trains there. A little old man too.
ANd yes! the Nightrain guy couldn’t see anything but “down”. It’s not like he was searching my legs out- it’s just that was all that was in his line of vision and like the legs existed by themselves.