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Lyr Req: Can you line up? / Linin' Track

25 Mar 00 - 10:42 PM (#201526)
Subject: Can you line up?
From: GUEST,collapsed_dream@Yahoo.com

Can any of you fine lad and lasses help a tracking laying man out? I'm looking for the Lyrics to a song that contains the lines " boys can you line up? Shak-a-lacka boys can you line the tracks? I said oh boys can you line up?" If any one knows were I could find them, I would be very thankful.


25 Mar 00 - 10:58 PM (#201537)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: Amos

A lengthy discussion on variants of this song can be found HERE. Hope that helps.

A


25 Mar 00 - 11:02 PM (#201543)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: Amos

Actually, this is not the excat version you asked about which I believe is a Leadbelly song and I have only a part from mempory:

Ho, boys, cancha line em? (Shakalaka)
Ho, boys cancha line that track
Ho boys, cancha line 'em (Shakalaka) Hya come the boss lookin' down that track.

Like many heavy work songs the "SHAKalaka" was used to coordinate the effort of putting weight on the shifting irons all along a rail at the same time, to persuade it to move, as I understand it.

Anyone else know where this one can be found?


25 Mar 00 - 11:10 PM (#201550)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: GUEST,collapsed_Dream@Yahoo.com

Hey thanks a lot for the help. I'm part of a club for a band called "Hog Eye Navvy" . They play Shanty/gealic/irish/scottish music in Indiana, and I was just trying to find a majority of the lyrics of their songs so people can learn'em and sing along. Thanks again.


26 Mar 00 - 03:24 PM (#201762)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: Pinetop Slim

Heard Kerner, Ray and Glover sing this in the '60s, but I remember it mostly because of the late David Tengren of Norton, Mass., who used to sing it occasionally while doing his work. Dave Wielded a mallet and chisels, not to mention chain saw, adze and broad ax, as a carver of totem poles and statues.
Sorry for the thread creep, but it struck me that it might be of interest to someone that an old railroad work song lived on for a time as a wood-carving song.
In turn, Tengren's work inspired a haiku by his friend Daniel Grady: Arms ache
My work done
Toast thanks
To the setting sun
Chisels lie still


16 Jun 06 - 05:10 PM (#1761743)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: GUEST,brotherecjc@Yahoo.com


16 Jun 06 - 05:12 PM (#1761746)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: GUEST,guest

Leadbelly sang that song. I had it on an album of his complete songs. I imagine something like that exists on CD.

Michele


20 Jun 06 - 09:04 AM (#1764554)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up?
From: Jim Dixon

The song is usually called LININ' TRACK. That's the title used by Leadbelly and by Koerner, Ray & Glover on their album "Blues, Rags & Hollers" from 1963. It has also been recorded separately by Spider John Koerner and by Long John Baldry, John Denver, Jesse Fuller, Jim Kweskin, Taj Mahal, Fred Neil, and a few others.

See these threads:

Lyr Add: Linin' Track (from Koerner, Ray & Glover)

Eloise?


26 Apr 11 - 11:05 PM (#3143119)
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Can you line up? / Linin' Track
From: GUEST,Tengren's sis

Can't beleive I'm reading about someone remebering my brother, right down to Danny's poem....he's been gone 21 yrs. this June.--We used to listen to that song done by Taj Mahal. Great memories :)