Someone asked via email;
Hello there,
I'm looking to download this song I lost a long time ago on cassette. I remember the lyrics because i've felt them every once in a while. Even during stable relationships, haha.
The devil rode on a big black stallion traveling in a cloud of flames (x3)
Drifter was his name
Driftre destroyed teh hearts of women all across the land (x3)
he lives in the minds I know, of evrey travelin' man
and so on, till the main lines appear:
The wind's my lover
and Drifter's my steed
and the devil's theonly friend
I'll ever need
The wind, the Drifter, the Devil an' me
we ride together through all eternity
If you know these lyrics, please end my search and tell me where they come from!
Enjoy your day and greetings from Holland!
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So I go to my old friend Google and enter in parts of the lyrics to see what I can come up with.
I start with "The devil rode on a big black stallion traveling in a cloud of flames" no quote marks.
I get a lot of hits from literature about black stallions, it seems that many books were written about black stallions, named devil.
So I try a few other combinations because I figure that the asker of the question may not be remembering the lyric just right, as is often the case.
Again I am coming up with many hits to items that have black, devil, and stallion in them.
So I think maybe I should simplify the search and put part of it in quotes for an exact match. So this time I enter "The Devil Rode on a Big Black Stallion"
Bingo I get a hit to Charles Mingus' album "Changes One" which has the song Devil Blues.
Which has the lyrics; "The Devil rode on a big black stallion, ridin' on a cloud of rain..."
I am guessing that this is the song that you are refering to.
Which gets me to thinking, wait a minute Robert Johnson wrote a song called Me and the Devil Blues. Which led me to...
Probably most interesting of all;
Feel free to send any blues questions that you might have to my email address above, when I have time I like to do the research and find answers to interesting questions.
As it heats up, try to stay cool and stay blue.
9 comments:
well, dang :)if only I had taken the time to scroll down past the lyrics...I could have saved myself an hour or so just repeating what you did. I did find a forum called Leo's Lyrics Forum where people are asking for help finding lyrics. it's free to join. maybe he could find it there if the one you found isn't it. I truly believe ole Robert Johnson had himself an ongoing relationship with the devil. I had a husband once that did...used to have conversations with him regularly...in a drunken stupor...it was really creepy :) I had never known anyone with so close a relationship with the evil one before....
I'm sorry to say gentlemen, both songs aren't the song I was referring to. I'm very glad though with the effortsome answer I got. Me and teh devil blues is as far as I got. Considering i'm more of a jazz-fan than a blues-one, I was happy to add Mingus to my music library.
Another hint on the song:
'here's the part that tears a man's heart out, make a man wanna commit sideways..
I also vaguely recall the singer saying the name Buddy somewhere in the song, as if he was doing a duet. Also there's a violin-solo somewhere along verse 3 or 4. This song must last at least 8 minutes.
We'll keep searching! Thanks for your help!
Sorry I forgot to tel y'all that the lyrics in devil's blues (Mingus' version) do resemble the lyrics in the song I sought. But the blues-version was the one I was looking for!
Prin, thanks so much for stopping by and leaving your thoughtful comment. And it is funny how the devil has a close personal relationship with a lot of people. LOL.
Mass, sorry that I did not find the song that you are looking for, but I think the Mingus version is the same song, you may have heard it being done by someone else.
The lyrics suggest to me very strongly that the song searched for is "The Drifter" by the legendary Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. He recorded many versions of it. One on his "Makin'Music" album with Roy Clark, and a very good one on the budget collector "Okie Dokie Stomp" come to mind.
That's the song. The quoted lyrics are the exact ones Gatemouth sings. Also, the violin solo fits, cause Gatemouth played the fiddle (violin).
Hope it helps and enjoy!
The artist to whom you refer is indeed Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown. He did this as a slow (tempo ~55) blues in live performances such as the one I heard in Baltimore MD ca. 1985. He sings, plays the lead guitar and the lead violin solo too. Here's another verse:
But I meet a woman every now and then, that makes me want to live life like other men (2X)
But I know deep down inside that it's time to saddle up the drifter and ride.
blue_sam22 and ublokr, thanks so much for your input. I will have to repost this with your answers. I love Clarance "Gatemouth" Brown and was really sad when he passed away.
That song has haunted me since 1978 when I heard it on a radio show in Greeley Colorado. The announcer said Clarence Gatemouth Brown had sung and played the song at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1971. When I googled nit just now I found this blog and the comments and lyrics. Thanks for refreshing my memory. Note that Gatemouth played the fiddle masterfully in this blues piece. He made it whine and moan like a woman fussing at her man. And I always wondered what it would feel like to commit "sideways."
Now, will someone please tell me where to download the recording?
You can find the song "The Drifter" on the following Clarence Gatemouth Brown albums (Use utorrent.com to download the files through the associated torrents):
Makin' Music (with Roy Clark) 1979
http://torcache.com/torrent/364E7BDE0DE44DA748D302544A117F7DBF68E7E3.torrent
Gates on the Heat 1975
Okie Dokie Swamp 1999
Timeless 2004
http://torcache.com/torrent/242ED46D17640DB37CA9A1E7778CDB8ED64E1F91.torrent
You can listen to a scratchy recording here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeoSx8DsKB0
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