The Comedy of Errors: Drive Like Jehu - Bullet Train to Vegas (12 June 1992)

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Bullet Train to Vegas was one half of a 7-inch single which San Diego’s Drive Like Jehu released as a holding operation between their eponymous 1992 debut album and their 1994 swansong, Yank Crime. With it’s driving, repetitive riff and hundred mile an hour tempo, it’s an arresting piece of hardcore rock which gallops straight at and through the listener with the force of the titular train.  But how does it compare to other train based pop songs? And who did trains better - Britain or America?

1) Ocean Colour Scene - The Day We Caught the Train - For a band that was often accused of being rooted in the past, there’s something rather appropriate that one of their best known songs is a nostalgia-fest for days spent hanging out with friends and taking a train journey, probably down to Brighton given how in thrall they were to Mod-era Who.  Speaking of whom...

2) The Who - 5.15 - Sitting at the top of side 3 of their 1973 rock opera, Quadrophenia, this promises escape, just like Bullet Train to Vegas, but in typical PeteTownshend style, there’s no jollies to be had  in this train trip to the Brighton coast. With Mod anti-hero Jimmy thrown out of his home and desperately searching for meaning, the train here serves as a vessel for the damaged.  In the Who’s case, it’s speed; for Drive Like Jehu, it’s alcohol, but with the difference that Drive Like Jehu sound like they’re looking forward to getting bombed.  I love 5.15 and really ought to give the full album a try one day.  I’ve seen the film, mainly because Danny Peary wrote about it in Cult Movies 2 and seem to be in the minority of people who found it a slog to sit through. Like getting the London to Brighton direct line train and getting stuck for 2 hours due to signal failure at Croydon.

3) Gladys Knight and the Pips - Midnight Train to Georgia - well, in musical terms, this was always like having a whole Amtrak train to yourself with four-poster beds in every cabin and teasmades which pour vintage champagne.  In comparison, Drive Like Jehu (and everyone else on this list) crowd into third class, splitting a four pack of beers between them.  But American train songs always seem far more geographically bold.  We’ve gone to Las Vegas, Georgia and next up, we’re on a track towards Heaven.

4) Bob Dylan - Slow Train - it’s interesting, but I’m currently listing selections from Peel’s BFBS shows of November 1992 in order to soundtrack a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream that I was rehearsing/performing through October-December ‘92.  By this point, Peel had long tired of
Dylan’s output, finding his 1980s releases uninspiring and his live performances, some of which he had to review for The Observer, phoned in to the point of contempt for his audience.  However, he had heard and enjoyed Dylan’s 1992 album, Good As I Been to You and played tracks from it on his shows.  I’ve not been persuaded by any of them yet, but do find myself increasingly being drawn to Dylan’s 70s work.  Having got over the urge to play games with those who expected him to produce world changing lyrical statements in the 60s, Dylan seems willing to give more of himself in his 70s compositions and as a result becomes far more engaging to listen to.  As his ensembles got larger and the songs got longer, he seems - on the admittedly limited evidence I’ve heard - to have worked to the theory that if he was writing 6/7/8 minute tracks that there was little room for self indulgence.  Keep things moving and keep them interesting, everything is to the service of the song.  It means that he can get away, effortlessly, with tracks like the semi-title track to his 1979 album, Slow Train Coming, recorded after Dylan converted to Christianity.  Getting stuck on a train with someone trying to convert you may seem like hell, but Dylan’s gift with a melody means that it cannot be entirely dismissed as long as the bar remains open or one of Drive Like Jehu’s beers remains available to be shared while discussing the issues.

5) Travis - Last Train - When this band released their debut album, Good Feeling in 1997, they appeared all set to become the new Oasis.  By the time they released their third album, The Invisible Band in 2001, they appeared to be settling for becoming the new Runrig.  This could be intensely frustrating at times, but they got away with it because beneath the deceptively flimsy arrangements of their songs, Fran Healy could always be relied upon to come up with lyrics that could be casually, emotionally devastating.  Last Train starts out like it’s soundtracking a Cold War thriller, but takes diversions through writer’s block, lost love, plans of murder and ends on a note suggesting that Healy will go on to throw himself under a train once he has completed his broken hearted killing spree.  I can picture Drive Like Jehu coming home equally bleary-eyed and depressed after their Vegas blow out.

So who did trains in song better - UK or USA?  To be honest, I really can’t tell based on my list.  All of the tracks including Drive Like Jehu’s offer plenty of aural delights.  The USA could steal a march if we throw in Love Train by The O’Jays, but the UK comes roaring back into contention with Groovy Train by The Farm.  I think ultimately I may have to give the nod to the UK mainly thanks to
 John Peel’s 2004 favourites, Bloc Party due to their track Waiting For the 7.18 being the only one of the songs here to sum up the true essence of train travel: standing around, waiting. Waiting for escape, fun, revelation, the way home or just to get out of the cold.

Please feel free to add your own train based compositions, but please...nothing by this lot.



Go to 1:12 for a cracking Ocean Colour Scene related blooper. Video courtesy of Jack Judge.

Video courtesy of Drive Like Jehu - Topic