Added: 5 years ago
From: maolchalium
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  • It probably is not about the underground railroad. The train goes into New Orleans, which would not be the way to freedom for a slave. It seems to literally be about an unscrupulous engineer skipping a tariff. Great song though.

  • nice vibrato sound

  • He's got pig iron...he's got pig iron...he's got aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllll­l pig irrrrrrrrrrrrrrrron.....

  • This is not the original by Lonnie Donegan which came out in 1956. It's a remake.

  • @FredCDobbs00 Yes. Made after he left the Chris Barber band. The Barber version is better.

  • This hit by Lonnie Donegan would finish at #50 for the year, 1956. On July 9, 1955, Bill Haley and His Comets hit #1 with Rock Around the Clock, signifying the start of the Rock Era. On April 21, 1956, Elvis Presley hit #1 with Heartbreak Hotel, shooting this new sound into the stratosphere.

  • Pig Iron - The traditional shape of the molds used for these ingots was a branching structure formed in sand, with many individual ingots at right angles to a central channel or runner. Such a configuration is similar in appearance to a litter of piglets suckling on a sow. When the metal had cooled and hardened, the smaller ingots (the pigs) were simply broken from the much thinner runner (the sow), hence the name pig iron.

  • Pig iron is the intermediate product of smelting iron ore with a high-carbon fuel such as coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Charcoal and anthracite have also been used as fuel. Pig iron has a very high carbon content, typically 3.5–4.5%,[1] which makes it very brittle and not useful directly as a material except for limited applications. Wiki

  • Comment removed

  • Pig iron: a railroad term to the solidifyed iron they used. They called it Pig iron because at the time, pig was considered poor man meat,and pig iron was cheap metal

  • this iz a pya tune!!!!! ked you know what am sayin tho

  • Indeed...disliking a video because of the description despite the fact that the song kicks ass makes a lot of sense...not.

  • Im sorry but the description is just horrible. "Pig iron" is not slaves. it refers to illegal imports (guns, gambling equipment, alcohol). This is a chain gang song, not an underground railroad song. Thus I am disliking this video.

  • @linksgard2

    your both wrong. Pig iron is poorly made steel made by mixing steel with carbon. Look it up

  • @linksgard2

    At the time you had to pay a toll for transporting industrial goods

  • I like this song a lot but doesn't Mr Donegan sound a little bit like a South Park character in the beginning??

  • This is a great song. Funny Paul McCartney is the one who showed me this song, now i'm trying to learn it on guitar. Personally i like Paul's version better that's the one I'm learning. But they don't make music like they use to :)

  • Butters Stotch has grown up.

  • THE BEST VERSION BY A COUNTRY MILE !

    FULL STEAM FROM START TO FINNISH !

  • This guy was Scottish, the forefarther of Rock N Roll, out of Skiffle, in the UK. My understanding of this song was that there was a heavy tax on moving iron across frontiers in America, and the engine drivers used to declare any cargo except pig iron to avoid the taxation. The song comes from an engine driver who had just fooled Customs.

    It sounds right when you look at it in this light. We will never know what Lonnie was actually singing about now.....But a great song.

  • He injects so much energy and fun into his songs- its a devil to sing at his speed, just try the chorus. LOVE IT. Like Pick a bale of Cotton and Battle of New Orleans his versions beat the pants off the rest , yes sireeeeee!

  • Pig Iron was also slang for cheap, unreliable guns made from the crude pig iron. I'm somewhat inclined to think that that's what the song is about.

  • Lonnie Donegan was an inspiration to Paul McCartney

  • @steved410 so great to see another person who knows this lol thats amazing

  • this is amazing song..

  • lol i <3 this song

  • One story is that "pig iron" was gambling machines

  • @dickhembo2 Or it could have been slaves escaping?

  • I spent hours practicing this many years ago. I can still sing it!!

  • CIVILIZATION IV shows Lonnie's genius!! But you have to pay close attention!! RIP to the KING OF SKIFFLE!! Long live your memory!!

  • Fantastic. I'd forgotten what a great record this is.

  • Great song and cool history behind it. Thank you for posting this!

  • Of course, the closest the C.R.I.& P. got to New Orleans was Eunice LA-- but, you're not supposed to know that. Still, it's a fun song, even if there was no rail toll bridge in N.O.

  • When iron is tapped from the blast furnace it goes into troughs, one long one and smaller ones coming from it, these resemble young piglets feeding from the mother sow - hence the name pig iron - I know I worked there for 46 years!!!

  • holy crap AWSOME so fast so coooooooool :D

  • i got sheep, i got all livestock, i got pig iron!! u legend. Ive also hold the slavery thing mentioned. Who knows. Ask Lonnie himself

  • i got sheep, i got all livestock, i got pig iron!! u legend

  • one of my late mums favourite songs x

  • Have you got any PIG Iron ???

  • Rock Island Line!

  • I worked for the now defunct Rock Island line (Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad) in their Kansas City, Kansas yard in the mid-1960s. Too bad it's no longer around!

  • 3:00-3:10 is possibly my favorite moments in music ever.

  • My grandfather worked on the Rock Island Railroad till his death in 1970, seven years before I came around. I've always had a soft spot for this song because of him, because I know it was a song he liked as well.

  • This is a great song but it's not about the underground railroad... The song was written by a convict in Alabama in the early 1900s- nearly half a century after it would have happened. Lead Belly picked it up from him while he was working as a driver for John Lomax in Louisiana.

    Don't let that detract from the bluesy nature of it: it's a song written by a convict about tax evasion on the railroad. Don't get more bluesy than that.

  • This is not as raw or as raciuos as his original version.

  • " i fooled you, i fooled you, i got pig iron, i got pig iron, i got all pig iron"

  • I was inspired to look-up this song after playing "Civilization IV" - Lonnie Donegan sings it much better than Leonard Limoy!

    ;-)

  • Rory Gallagher plays on this :).

    To those who don't know Rory, he was basically a blues irish musician inspired by the older blues-folk artists & highly respected by the likes of Dylan/Lennon/Clapton.

    Does some mean fucking electric-blues & slide work, definitely worth the look

  • First song i ever got paid for playing live in 1964.....!!! On washboards .....of course...!!! Thank You for this.....Now where's me thimbles......bj

  • lonnie donegans best seller was does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bedpost overnight.

  • The best ever. I said a fooled you, I fooled you, I got pig -iron, I got pig-iron, I got aaaaaaaaaaaallllllll pig irrrrrrrooooooooonnnnnnnnn. The rock island line is a mighty good road!

    So the rock island line is a mighty good road, rock island line is the road to ride, yea.. the rock island line is a mighty good road , get your ticket at the station for the rock island line

    Abcwxyz cat in the corner and you dont see me! God I need some pig iron

  • The best ever. I said a fooled you, I fooled you, I got pig -irn, I got pig-irn I got all pig iron

  • This is Ace

  • Lonnie is a white man thinkin he's black, but in a good way. Not eminem way

  • 10 people must be employees of the Rock Island's rival railroads.

  • im only 24 but i do love this song !

  • love this mad bastard

  • This song is about smuggling slot machines, once known as "Pig Iron", because they ate money like pigs.

  • Takes me back to my misspent youth running cigs out of Calais,

  • what a fuckin tune!!!! yee ha. And i hope youre sayin that dylan is better than the beatles. Cos this dude is incomparable to the beatles or dylan . Very influential even though it may not sound apparent immediately

    I love lonnie. I had never ever heard him until a saw an advert on telly with this tune. It was a car surfing. Dont remember the car manufacturer at allbut i sure as hell found out who done the song. It was rock island line by l donegan

  • what a fuckin tune!!!! yee ha

  • might be right might be wrong u i know u gonna miss me

  • pretty lame compared to Leadbelly's original

  • @viktorvaldemar I don't know, I listened to them both, they're both extremely good, but this version puts an interesting twist on it with the weird British/American South sounding accent, extremely distinctive voice like I've never ever heard before.

  • I use to play this record over and over and over again when I was a kid. My Birth Father use to be an auctioneer........So, it's a joy to hear this one again for fun. :)

  • DYLAN WAS BETTER,NICE TRY LONNIE.R.I.P.

  • My sister had the original 78 record and it sounded a lot better than this ,I remember it being played hour after hour as a young kid on an old wind up record player along with Bill Haley and the Rockets playing ''Rock around the Clock'' !!

  • Is it true that "pig iron" means Slaves ?

  • Nope,

    pig iron means iron ore. Only live stock could pass the big toll gate at no charge. So the driver shouted out all his live stock he´d got on board and missed out the goods he'd had to pay for.

  • @pipier100

    There's the further point that live stock had to be delivered quickly before any of the animals died. Live stock had the highest priority of any freight, sometimes even higher than passenger trains.

  • no, it means iron.

  • @sakax No it mean pig iron

  • This song made the Beatles.

  • @oneUNITED7SS

    Sorry ,have I missed something ,cant recall the Beatles ever playing this one and even if they did at their early gigs,well it was not a hit or ever in the charts,perhaps you can enlighten me on your comment ?

  • What I mean is, Lonnie Donegan gained fame with this song, and proceeded to record Cumberland Gap. John Lennon heard Cumberland Gap and was inspired by that to create a Skiffle Group, better known as the Quarrymen. From there, the rest is history.

  • @oneUNITED7SS

    Oh ok,yes I can see what you meant now,did you or do you like the Beatles then ?

    They were more my era than lonnie Donegan .I thought the Beatles were the best ever and I feel a lot better than whats about today.Some of the words in their songs were so meaningfull ,sheer poetry !!

    Leaving home ,64 etc so much about life and emotions all combined with wonderfull tunes .

  • I figured Within You Without You was by far one of their most intriguing songs. The instrumentation makes me feel like a bird, I must say.

  • This version is better than the more popular recording.

  • this is the most popular version by a long shot, the reason people look at leadbellys original version is out of curiosity.

    this song pretty much defined british music and rock and roll..

    released late 1955... made the top 10 in the uk and the usa in 1956

  • I memorized the words to this when I was 16 (long time ago) and couldn't wait for it to come on the radio (in the car) so I could sing along

  • Comment removed

  • Isn't it the Celtic Rock Festival near Cardigan this week end?

  • iechyd da

  • Proud to be Welsh homes!

  • I've only just discovered Lonnie Donegan, but this is the most amazing rendition!

  • In the song "Rock Island Line" the term "Pig Iron" is railway slang for contraband Slot Machines. Hence the "toll" or "bribe" for the man who wanted to know "what was on board". The whole song is a metaphor for "Do Unto Others, then Run Like Hell!"

  • 1: I am reading your comment, fine.

    2: Yeah, it is stupid, Im also thinking your a faggot

    3: I DID notice you skipped 3, since youtube is filled with this shit

    4: I didnt need to check it since its the same as every other gay spam comment on youtube

    5: Im not smiling you fucking faggot

    6: Well done faggot. Amazing discovery

    7: Its not true you fucking gimp go fuck a horse

    8: I fucking did notice. Maybe if you thought up your own fucking spam instead of copying some other bastards.

    9: stop spammi

  • I heard this for the 1st time today on the BBC Radio 2 Steve wright show and loved it straight away that's why I was looking for it tonight.

    Oldies are the best :)

    Ed (34) Glasgow.

  • Pig iron is a type of metal. The 109 SP Howitzer I drove in the Army in the early 1970's was made out of pig iron. I agree with "maolchalium".

  • great great good only joking adsolotly brilleant

  • brilleant

  • Crude iron obtained directly from the blast furnace and cast in molds (see cast iron). The crude ingots, called pigs, are then remelted along with scrap and alloying elements and recast into molds to produce various iron and steel products

  • @maolchalium ur all wrong pig iron is slot machines

  • johnny cash said it meant slot machines. mechanics have told me difrent. i guess everyone has there own meaning 4 words

  • i could be rong . johnny cash said slot machines . i had mechanics tell me thats what it is. i guess everyone has ther own meanings 4 words

  • Comment removed

  • I LOVE this song. This presentation is superb. I grew up by a railroad track and played this game over and over and over again!

  • this is the best recording of it, .. got some emotion

  • The Rock Island Line on February 22, 1854, became the first railroad to connect Chicago with the Mississippi River.

    The'underground railway' smuggling escaped slaves to the north started at Station No 1. Quincy. Illinois, on the banks of the Mississippi. This song probably refers to helping escaped slaves on their way to freedom. You'll need to google 'underground railway' to find out the rest.

  • Alternatively some sneaky asshole trying to get out of paying extra.

    Not everything needs some deep meaning ya know?

  • @maolchalium ur right im from ri and there is alot of under grond rr all in the houses here

  • Guess how many fags with too much time can google "pig iron"........? too many...

  • pig iron is intermediate product of smelting iron ore with coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Pig iron has a very high carbon content,

  • who cares what pig iron refers to, its a might good road nonetheless:) sod it, great song

  • i think we better consult ledbetter about what it was about

  • Great video!

  • Thanks a lot - I'm a great fan of Viv too!

  • Now i know how this originaly goes now.

    As all i had as reference was Stan Freeberg's 78 on my dads radiogram as a kid.

  • 'Pig Iron referred to slot machines or other gambling instruements in this song...

  • Pig iron is the intermediate product of smelting iron ore with coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Pig iron has a very high carbon content, typically 3.54.5%,[1] which makes it very brittle and not useful directly as a material except for limited applications.

  • but in the vernacular of New Orleans, pig iron referred to slot machines and other gambling devices. It was like calling dice 'bones.'

  • why would a freight train in this case ship slot machines and does this song have anything to do with New Orleans?

  • The Rock Island Line ran FROM new Orleans, and smuggled slot machines were common.

  • what'ya got on board there boy?

  • Love the way he says that

  • This song gives me the chills.

    Fantastic!!!!!!!!!!

  • mint song, sad bastard video, get out! get a shag, get her pregnant then punch her in the stomach

  • Oh dear. Got girl friend problems have you kevape?

  • I first heard this when i was a child and my Dad was playing along in the kitchen, to the album on his clarinet-great accustix in the washing up bowl!It still makes me smile and want to dance 20 years on, and my daughter listens to it now!!

  • i prefer the johnny cash cover

  • andi lern schreiben

  • this is e song sog from a erman car tv spot 5*****

  • Kewl :D

  • Amazing song ;D

    First time I heard this was on a home video of me when I was like 4.

    But I still love it xD

  • skiffe is where rock n roll started, no skiffle no rock n roll. long live skiffle.

  • We never had skiffe in America,why do this guy keep playing leadbelly songs?

  • because he liked them, had been influenced by Leadbelly and found them easy to adapt to a skiffle style likewise with Woody Guthrie songs.

  • no he was an irish londoner born in scotland

  • i think thats faster than johnnys

  • my dad loves this i do now

  • Absolutely great.My then fiancee & I saw him in concert at Nottingham Empire some 50 years ago

  • walress

    lonnie was born in glasgow,hardly irish!!!!

  • this song is my favourite

  • my big sister went out with his son for 3 years

  • I may be right, I may be wrong, but wasn't John Lennon inspired by the popularity of Lonnie Donegan to form a skittle band? Without Lonnie, we may never have had The Beatles.

  • Make that SKIFFLE, not skittle. God damn candy commercials!!

  • lmaoooo!

  • CHUGGACHUGGACHUGGA How bout that, the Rock Island Line makes it Wales.

  • He fooled us all. I taught he was American(rock iron Line), (Battle of New Orleons). Then I Think he's English, (My old man'S a Dustman), but then I remember he's Irish. And noboby loves like an Irishman!!! R.I.P

  • No, he's Scottish

  • He sed I FOOLED YA; I FOOLED YA; I GOT PIG IROOON I GOT PIG IROON!!!!

    X

    my dad sings that everyday.... its worrying

    Lol X

  • I'm an American who wants to thank Donnegan for his contributions not only to British music and rock and roll, but music in general, paving the way for the great musicians who came after him. He was a true original, and his music remains alive today.

  • Nice to know the man was appreciated in the States too. I was sixteen when this came out and it totally blew me away. Managed to see him a couple of times, always the complete pro.

  • @TheCardCheat

    Testify!

  • Cash was brilliant but not in the same class as Donegan.

  • Thank you for David Bowie and George Harrison. Thank you!

  • This was Lonnie Donegan while he was a banjo player in the Chrish Barber Jazz band. After a session of recording, they left the mike open and the 18 year old Donegan, recording this son gin 2 takes. You can hear mostly the second take , pretty good eh?

  • Great song that I inherited in my dads collection - thanks for the bit of history

  • I think you mean you`re gay. learn to write in a manner more in line with an erudite contributer.

  • puto estilo

    saludos

  • without this guy - no david bowie......work out why yourself

  • how can u say jony cashs is beter this is the origional its ace

  • Is this a live version? It sounds a lot different to the Lonnie Donegan version I've heard. I suspect the version I've heard is the studio version.

  • i agree... i prefer cash's...i think its because i prefer his voice to donegans

  • I prefere Lead Bellys voice to both of them.

  • I still like the sonny terry and brownie mcghee version from the "a long way from home" album, but this was... tolerable.

  • It's all about the Stan Freeburg version!!!

  • It's TOTALLY about the Freberg cover! Now that I've heard what he was parodying, Freberg's version is EVEN FUNNIER!!

  • Honour = Britain.

    Honor = USA

  • Didn t your mother teach you any manners? Evidently not. I see that you don t even have any videos to share, if you did it would probably be just your big fat mouth spewing crap.

  • o-my-god, i LOVE this song! it's sooo funny! xD thanks a lot for posting it! :)

  • he's starter of rock? omg...

  • Thank you for what I can only saw is we're missing these days

  • I've only ever heard the Johnny Cash version!

  • believe it or not this particular song started R & R

    tomi.

  • THIS SONG IS GREAT! =)

  • heard this for the first time tonight. Superb.