Something for Thursday

Does this amazing song need an introduction? No, not really.

I find myself increasingly amazed by the lyrical approach to a lot of the great songs that I’ve never really paid close attention to before. The singer here isn’t the one taking the “Midnight Train to Georgia”…well, she is, actually, but she’s not the one whose turns of life have made taking that train necessary. It’s her man who went to Hollywood with dreams of stardom, dreams that didn’t pan out, and now he has to return home. He can’t even drive himself, having pawned everything–he “pawned his dreams and sold his car”–just to live, and now all he can afford is the one way ticket home.

But at least he has his lover, who is going home with him on that same train. There’s romance, after all, on those midnight trains that cross the nation while the rest of us are sleeping.