If one were to blindly listen to Casey Jones by Bill Murray and Casey Jones by The Grateful Dead, they would probably come to the conclusion that the two songs are very different and have nothing to do with each other aside from having the same title. The 1912 version by Bill Murray, is appropriate for its time period because the only instrument it uses are horns and the song is sung the way many things were in that time period, using a chorus that says the same things that were just said by the singer. It seems like a parlor song that a family would play in their living room, make the singer play the piano instead of the horn and the family sing the chorus and it would work out. The form of the stanzas is AA’B and in my opinion the only thing that captures me about the song is what the deeper meaning is. The Grateful dead have a much more fun version of this song. By using guitar and drums there is background music incase you want to have a conversation while listening to the song. There are different lyrics that are more interesting and that seem to have many more meanings and there is a brief jam session.

            These two songs are clearly written for their time periods. No one had rocked out on a guitar yet, in the early 20^th century. They were more accustomed to this type more boring music. ‘The dead’, had started a phenomenon of psychedelic music. If they were going to be the fourth (recorded and known) band to cover Casey Jones it had to be done in a way that their ever growing following would be interested in. Meaning that it had to have a groovy guitar riff with light background drums and a sort of up beat way of singing it. The lyrics of Bill Murray’s version (After listening to them over and over again, and comparing them with the dead’s) seem to be about an honorable train engineer who is going to do something risky for his family that will leave them better off financially. As you get through the song you realize that he is going to die. At the end its explained that despite the noble act the wife is going to find another replacement husband. The story in the “Grateful Dead’s” song seems to be about a similar story. Someone who has some sort of trouble and his headed towards more. He uses cocaine to escape that trouble but it leads him to more trouble by using it. Just like how the character uses this job to escape his financial troubles in the Murray version but then has trouble ahead which is dyeing in a train crash. This makes me think that the meanings of the Grateful Dead lyrics are superior because they can be universally applied.

            I think that it is this line in the song, “Trouble ahead, trouble behind” that really makes this relate to the working class or the late 19^th century. At that time they were the workers that people like Marx, wrote about. The kind of people that could never gain in the ranks of there bosses only continue to become further away from them. The kind of people that had trouble in that life style and if they tried to get away from it would only end up with more trouble. This applies to people now, who wanted to take out loans to upgrade there lives, (or escape their troubles) and instead now have bad credit and are struggling terribly in these times. “You know that notion just crossed my mind”, is a nice way of saying hindsight 20’20 I would have done things a little differently. I think both versions are good songs with lessons to be learned but the chorus on The Grateful Dead version is just too good and universal. It’s also a much easier listen.