Friday August 13, 2021 “Casey Jones” Grateful Dead
As we continue our train adventures this week we are getting on a train with Casey Jones and it may not turn out that well.
Grateful Dead Lyricist Robert Hunter came up with the line “Drivin that train, high on cocaine, Casey Jones you’d better watch your speed,” which he wrote down and put in his pocket. He didn’t think of it as part of a song until he looked at it later and decided to complete the lyrics.
When they put the song together, Hunter looked for ways to omit the word “cocaine”, which at the time was a controversial word for song lyrics especially since the band had taken some heat for using “goddamn” in “Uncle John’s Band”. Hunter tried some other phrases like “whipping that chain”, “lugging propane” but he couldn’t find an acceptable substitute, so Casey Jones ended up high on cocaine as originally written.
The song is loosely based on actual happenings of engineer Casey Jones who was the heroic subject of “The Ballad of Casey Jones”. In an impending head-on crash of two trains, he took over the train, and although his life was ended when he was hit by a train traveling the wrong way, he sacrificed his life so those on board would be saved. The real Casey Jones was not high on cocaine.
Stay safe and well...and I wonder if Casey Jones was driving that train on Friday the thirteenth.