Railroad Boy by Gov't Mule

Album: By a Thread (2009)

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Songfacts®:

On this Delta Blues flavored update of the traditional folk song, Gov't Mule blend a Celtic sound with a swampy feel. Singer, guitarist, and songwriter Warren Haynes told Billboard magazine about it: "I need to research and find out exactly how old that song is, but I'm sure it's over 100 years old. I learned that song from some folk music friends of mine when I was 14 or 15, growing up sneaking into these folk clubs in North Carolina. It's a traditional Celtic folk song, and I played it for (producer) Gordy Johnson one night when we were just sitting around trying to decide what we were going to record and how. He came up with the idea of giving it a rock 'n roll treatment. We turned the band loose on it to see what would happen from an arrangement perspective, and everybody came up with all these great ideas. The next thing you know. it turned out like it is."

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