The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #174204   Message #4232753
Posted By: GUEST,gillymor
10-Dec-25 - 10:44 AM
Thread Name: Old Songs Newly Found
Subject: RE: Old Songs Newly Found
This will be a quickie and probably my last post until after the holidays because the Battle Ax, a sobriquet my wife has conferred upon herself, has given me a mile-long honeydo list to be completed by the 21st and it doesn't include fiddling around on the computer. So:

As a one-time devotee of the "Sport of Kings" I like horse race songs whether they serve as metaphors for a disappointing existence, a failed romance or describe an actual horse race. Here are a few:

The Wonderbeans only produced one LP, back in the '70's but it was a gem (sometime later on they put it on a CD and added a few more titles) and it inspired me to take up the mandolin. They're still my favorite old time string band and here we have their take on a song that was a hit for Eddy Arnold back in the fifties- Can't Win, Can't Place, Can't Show

Dave Edmunds, of Rockpile fame, covered George Jones' The Race is On, accompanied by The Stray Cats- The Race is On

The first Bluegrass band I fell in love with, from the D.C. area where I grew up (which at that time was a major hub for the genre), was the Country Gentlemen and with John Duffey singing lead and Eddie Adcock playing some wild banjo they produced- Going to the Races

I think I've mentioned Plains of Kildare by Brady and Irvine here before but it is a great horse race ballad that bears repeating. How could you not like a song with a talking horse- The Plains of Kildare