Monday July 25, 2022 “I’m Your Captain/Closer to Home” Grand Funk Railroad
In July of 1956 the Italian luxury liner Andrea Doria collided with the Swedish liner Stockholm, sinking the Andrea Doria. Terrible news event but how does this possibly relate to song of the day? Well, it doesn’t fit musically but it gives me pause for thought that maybe we should do something nautical this week…so get your captain’s cap out, fair winds and following seas ahead, here we go.
“I’m Your Captain/Closer to Home” was a real stylistic departure for the Detroit hard rocking power trio Grand Funk Railroad. Here’s how Grand Funk Railroad lead singer and “I’m Your Captain…” songwriter Mark Farner explained the transition: “Initially the song came to me after I said my prayers one night and I put a P.S. on the end of my prayers. I asked God to give me a song that would touch the hearts of people that the Creator wanted to get to.”
God bless his faith but does that seem as weird to you as to me. Hard rock & rolling, power trio, stadium filling, lead singer saying his evening prayers…with a P.S. to the Creator.
Cynicism aside this is a great tune and when it was released I played that Grand Funk album Closer to Home until the it was worn down so badly that it could no longer recreate sounds and also because I could easily sing along since the outro repeated the same lyric twenty eight times, “I’m getting closer to my home…”
Grand Funk has interesting beginnings with Mark Farner (guitar/vocals) and Don Brewer (drums) as part of the regionally successful Terry Knight and the Pack and Mel Schacher (bass) from ? and the Mysterians (“96 Tears”). Terry Knight would go on to become Grand Funk’s manager
Stay safe and well…and this is the radio friendly version of “I’m Your Captain,,,” the album version runs nearly twice as long.