John Train was first of all a character dreamed up by Phil Ochs as he increasingly fell prey to delusional thoughts, telling interviewers he was Train and had killed the real Ochs. A sad story. This John Train are a bunch of Philadelphians who have been recording for several years with Cowboy Dreams their first album to be released on vinyl. It was released some months ago in the States and recently a copy arrived here at Blabber’n’Smoke. We always accord vinyl submissions the appropriate sense of respect but we were immediately taken by the album art by acclaimed artist Crystal Latimer, well known for her work celebrating Latin American culture. The cover reminds one of celebrated albums by The Byrds, the New Riders Of The Purple Sage and Poco and the music contained within doesn’t stray too far from the era of those bands.
Talking of the album, songwriter and lead singer John Houlon says that when the band went into the studio to record he decided to “Pull all of my horse related material together and call the collection Cowboy Dreams.” The band (Houlon – vocal, acoustic guitar, Mike Brenner – steel guitar, dobro, Mike Frank – bass, Bill Fergusson – mandolin, bouzouki, Mark Tucker – lap steel, various guitars, piano and Mark Schreiber – drums, shaky things) play in a loose limbed country-folk-roots fashion which reminds one at times of the acoustic Grateful Dead along with Jerry Garcia’s bluegrass combo Old And In The Way while Brenner and Tucker’s pedal and lap steel solos add a little more bite (and twang) into the equation.
The instrumental track, Sun Up At Belmont, sets the scene perfectly with a whiff of Calexico included, then Blood Horses races in with the band setting a cosmic country groove as Houlon sings of the thoroughbreds which run at the Kentucky Derby. A spiralling guitar solo cements the Dead connection. Closer to the Dead’s offshoot, The New Riders, there’s the sparkling trot which is Since She Started To Ride (a Jonathan Richmond song) while Further (written by David Halley) is a wonderfully slow paced country lament. Twister meanwhile is quite a jaunty number which sounds like an upbeat John Stewart.
Somewhat surprisingly the title song is actually a cover of a Paddy McAloon song and the band don’t dramatically change it, they just dial it down a bit while adding some honeyed lap steel. It fits right in here. Toss in a furious honky tonk instrumental (Cuttin’ Down on Cuttin’ Up, Tucker’s contribution to the album) and a closing riposte to the opening instrumental (Sun Down At Belmont) and you have an album which, were it a horse, would be a sure bet.
Cowboy Dreams is available on John Train’s Bandcamp page