Trains And Boats And Planes

[pljms]

One of my personal favourite Bacharach & David songs is 'Trains And Boats And Planes' and I suppose it was inevitable given the fact it was a hit in the UK a year before the US through Bacharach's own recording that the first couple of acts to cover the song were both English, namely Anita Harris and Billy J Kramer & The Dakotas. Released when Bacharach's version was about to hit the UK charts in May 1965, Anita Harris's recording was the first time the bridge was sung rather than played instrumentally and I like the way she harmonises with herself from the second chorus onwards. She was also the first and so far only artist to record the Bacharach & David rarity 'London Life'.

[Sara D]

The general rule seemed to be that only female artists sang the bridge to Trains And Boats And Planes, although I'm sure there's been the occasional exception.

You'd think a song about 'Swinging London' released in the mid-60s would catch on but I don't think that London Life was memorable enough for that to have ever happened, pleasant though it undoubtedly was.

[blueonblue]

Anita's version of 'London Life' is charming and nostalgic but I think if Burt had offered it to Barbra Streisand it could have become more popular, it seems tailor-made for her.

'blue'

[Jim Dixon]

Burt gets so much mileage out of four basic chords in this song. It's almost like some of the music on Miles Davis' "Kind of Blue", you hear it and wonder how something so simple could sound so fresh.

And the 12-bar verses and chorus feel related to the blues, even if the chord changes don't happen exactly where they would in a 12-bar blues, and the chords aren't quite those of a blues progression. The repetition of those key short melodic phrases in the over and over in the verses and in the chorus reinforces that folk-like feel. It's like a folk song written by Erik Satie.

For the Rhino box, it's one of the few places where I would have made a different call and used the Dionne version, even though the box had a delicate balancing act to make sure the set didn't turn into "Dionne's Greatest Bacharach plus Some Other Stuff".

But I do love the Wurlitzer sound on the Bacharach solo recording, maybe just because its higher in the mix and a little more gritty than it sounds behind Dionne. Interesting that Dionne took the song a step higher than The Breakaways. It seems like more often Dionne's versions were likely to be a little lower than other female vocalists.

[pljms]

The relative simplicity of 'Trains And Boats And Planes' probably explains why several country artists have gravitated towards it over the years and back in the day when such places still existed I recall being in a folk club in London and a solo female performer prefacing her rendition of the song with these words, "I bet this is the first time a Burt Bacharach song has been performed in this establishment".

Here's Laura Cantrell performing the song live and afterwards referencing The Box Tops' recording, a version that might be unique in that the lead vocalist is male and he actually sings the song's bridge.

[Jim Dixon]

....prefacing her rendition of the song with these words, "I bet this is the first time a Burt Bacharach song has been performed in this establishment".
....referencing The Box Tops' recording, a version that might be unique in that the lead vocalist is male and he actually sings the song's bridge.

Speaking of Alex Chilton and playing Bacharach in less fancy establishment, Alex would sometimes break out "The Look of Love" during rock club gigs in the 1980s for audiences who were largely there because of his Big Star and late-1970s new wave/psychobilly recordings. You can hear him so do at 21:27 in this Youtube:

Alex was 16 when he recorded "Trains and Boats and Planes". It was a filler track for the first album, rushed out to capitalize on the unexpected success of "The Letter". He doesn't sound like he's comfortable with the song yet, but also, Dan Penn, who was producing, was coaching him heavily during that record and basically giving him the exact vocal phrasing that Penn wanted to hear. I still like that version because I'm a fan of Alex's, though it sounds a little strident and lacking the charm of Dionne's record.

[pljms]

No, Alex Chilton of The Box Tops doesn't sound entirely at ease on their version of 'Trains And Boats And Planes' but it's good that he sang all the lyrics.

It's been noted how the song's simplicity attracted some country, folk and rock acts. Conversely, because the chords are so basic jazz musicians have tended to give the song a wide berth. However, that didn't stop saxophonist Stan Getz from recording it and inevitably the arranger Richard Evans couldn't resist extending one or two of those chords.

[pljms]

Singer Joanie Sommers has been featured quite a bit on here because of her involvement in the Bacharach & David TV musical 'On The Flip Side' and her version of 'Trains And Boats And Planes' features an arrangement that I think is different enough from the hit recordings by Burt and Dionne to be of interest.

[Sara D]

Like the Joanie Sommers recording of the song I think the arrangement on the version by Alma Cogan is certainly 'different' enough to make for an interesting listen. A friend alerted me to this version saying that parts of the arrangement have an almost Middle-Eastern feel and while that may be true I think that arranger Stan Foster might also have been inspired by the orchestration on Julie London's famous recording of Fly Me To The Moon. By the time Alma Cogan recorded Trains And Boats And Planes her chart-topping days in the UK had long since ceased and I recall that it was more her party-giving lifestyle and her friendship with the Beatles that kept her name in the British press. As she and Burt went back a long way (she recorded Keep Me In Mind in 1955 and had a minor hit with The Story Of My Life In 1958) there must have been more than a good chance that he would have attended several of her parties during his frequent visits to London in the mid-60s. Her recording of Trains And Boats And Planes first saw the light of day in 1967 on the posthumously released album 'Alma'.

[Jim Dixon]

...arranger Stan Foster might also have been inspired by the orchestration on Julie London's famous recording of Fly Me To The Moon.

Thanks for posting the Alma and referencing the Julie London "Fly Me To the Moon". That's some of the best singing I've heard London do, and that Ernie Freeman arrangement and conducting is surely no small part of it. It's got the electricity and tension of some of Esquivel's arrangements, though the pizzicato string interlude is something Esquivel would have been more creative with. Still, a great record.

The Stan Foster arrangement for Trains is really going for it, trying to reframe the song. It's got some interesting moments. I wish it wasn't bathed in quite so much reverb, and Alma had a little more of London's rhythmic precision, but these are nits. It's a cool record too.

[pljms]

When I saw the long list of famous artists who'd covered 'Trains And Boats And Planes' perhaps Alma Cogan's recording wasn't one of those I had particularly high expectations, but in actual fact it turned out to be one of the most intriguing versions I've heard and one that stayed with me for days after the first hearing. Not only was she the first British artist to record a Bacharach song when she covered 'Keep Me In My Mind' in 1955, but her first big hit in the UK the previous year had lyrics by none other than Hal David, namely 'Bell Bottom Blues'. Listening to this now it's easy to hear how she earned the sobriquet 'The girl with the giggle in her voice'.


Talking of 'cool' versions of Trains And Boats And Planes, they don't come more subtle and tastefully arranged than Dinah Shore's recording from 1967.

[Sara D]

It's nice that Julie London and Peggy Lee have been discussed or at least referred to on the forum recently because both are singers I grew up hearing a lot at home as my parents owned several of their albums on vinyl. Sadly neither of them recorded Trains And Boats And Planes and in fact across more than twenty studio albums it seems that Julie London cut only one Bacharach number, Wives And Lovers, and as it was recorded in the mid-60s she sings it straight and without any of the irony singers must feel almost obliged to bring to it today.

[Jim Dixon]

Julie London cut only one Bacharach number, Wives And Lovers, and as it was recorded in the mid-60s she sings it straight and without any of the irony singers must feel almost obliged to bring to it today.

Hal baked a big dose of irony right into that lyric, and there's no way to sing that song without it. Who is this narrator barking "Hey! Little girl" and sticking his (or her) nose into the business of the young wife? It's basically Hugh Hefner, someone with an incredibly shallow and cynical view of marriage and human nature. The idea that every young wife is, five evenings a week, going to "run to his arms" as soon as she hears a jingle at the front door, and she's going to be wearing a seductive outfit and primed for a roll in the hay...I think people got the cartoonish nature of this scene from the beginning. That's not to say that it's a secret feminist manifesto, but it's not meant to be understood as a vision of a long and happy marriage like "The Folks on the Hill".

[Sara D]

The few times Wives And Lovers has cropped up in discussions with female friends most if not all have said they found the lyrics condescending towards women at best and downright sexist at worst and they certainly wouldn't have detected any intended irony. I may or may not have mentioned to them in Hal David's defence that the song was written to tie-in with/promote/exploit the movie of the same name. It's a shame that because of the controversy surrounding the lyrics we hardly ever hear it sung anymore because musically it has to be one of Bacharach's best. Here's a version of the song I only heard for the first time a few years ago and which I think deserves to be better known.

[Blair N. Cummings]

I don`t hear any more "baked in" irony in `Wives...` than I do in `Wishin` & Hopin`, a similar sentiment. This was the default attitude in popular culture in the "mono and black & white" era. I`m not defending it and it was never reflective of reality, but it was the cultural assumption of the time.