"Ain't Got No Home" (or "I Ain't Got No Home in This World Anymore") is a song by Woody Guthrie, released on Dust Bowl Ballads , in which the singer laments the difficulties that life presents him. It was based on a gospel song Guthrie heard on his visits to the migrant camps known variously as "Can't Feel at Home" or "I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore", which had been made popular by the Carter Family in 1931.
Guthrie wrote his version of the song in response to this version, in an attempt to capture more effectively the "unrelieved anger" of the Dust Bowl refugees. [1] He was outraged by the song's message and the effects it had on the migrants, telling them to wait, and be meek. It was telling them to accept the hovels and the hunger and the disease and to not fight back. [2] Guthrie's version parodies the original song's fundamentalist religious sentiment that the poor should accept suffering in this world for rewards in the hereafter. [3]
An unreleased variant of the song protests the segregation at the Beach Haven apartment complex owned by Fred Trump, the father of United States President Donald Trump, which he stayed at from 1950 to 1952: "Beach Haven looks like heaven / Where no black ones come to roam! / No, no, no! Old Man Trump! / Old Beach Haven ain't my home!" This is similar in topic to Guthrie's unreleased song "Old Man Trump". [4]
Guthrie's friend Cisco Houston recorded the song for his 1960 album Cisco Houston Sings Songs of the Open Road .
Bruce Springsteen recorded the song for Folkways: A Vision Shared , a 1988 compendium of song recordings written by Guthrie and Lead Belly.
British folk musician Billy Bragg covered the song for his 2013 album Tooth & Nail .
Bob Dylan performed the song with The Band at both the afternoon and evening concerts for A Tribute To Woody Guthrie at Carnegie Hall on January 20, 1968. A recording of the first performance was released in 1972 on "A Tribute To Woody Guthrie Part One" Columbia KC 31171.
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie was an American singer-songwriter and composer who was one of the most significant figures in American folk music. His work focused on themes of American socialism and anti-fascism. He inspired several generations both politically and musically with songs such as "This Land Is Your Land".
"This Land Is Your Land" is a song by American folk singer Woody Guthrie. It is one of the United States' most famous folk songs. Its lyrics were written in 1940 in critical response to Irving Berlin's "God Bless America". Its melody is based on a Carter Family tune called "When the World's on Fire". When Guthrie was tired of hearing Kate Smith sing "God Bless America" on the radio in the late 1930s, he sarcastically called his song "God Blessed America for Me" before renaming it "This Land Is Your Land".
Gilbert Vandine "Cisco" Houston was an American folk singer and songwriter, who is closely associated with Woody Guthrie due to their extensive history of recording together.
Ramblin' Jack Elliott is an American folk singer and songwriter and musician.
"Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)" is a protest song with lyrics by Woody Guthrie and music by Martin Hoffman detailing the January 28, 1948 crash of a plane near Los Gatos Canyon, 20 miles (32 km) west of Coalinga in Fresno County, California, United States. The crash occurred in Los Gatos Canyon and not in the town of Los Gatos itself, which is in Santa Clara County, approximately 150 miles away. Guthrie was inspired to write the song by what he considered the racist mistreatment of the passengers before and after the accident. The crash resulted in the deaths of 32 people, 4 Americans and 28 migrant farm workers who were being deported from California back to Mexico.
Ellis Paul is an American singer-songwriter and folk musician. Born in Presque Isle, Aroostook County, Maine, Paul is a key figure in what has become known as the Boston school of songwriting, a literate, provocative, and urbanely romantic folk-pop style that helped ignite the folk revival of the 1990s. His pop music songs have appeared in movies and on television, bridging the gap between the modern folk sound and the populist traditions of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.
"Pastures of Plenty" is a 1941 composition by Woody Guthrie. Describing the travails and dignity of migrant workers in North America, it is evocative of the world described in John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. The tune is based on the ballad "Pretty Polly", a traditional English-language folk song from the British Isles that was also well known in the Appalachian region of North America.
Dust Bowl Ballads is an album by American folk singer Woody Guthrie. It was released by Victor Records, in 1940. All the songs on the album deal with the Dust Bowl and its effects on the country and its people. It is considered to be one of the first concept albums. It was Guthrie's first commercial recording and the most successful album of his career.
"Song to Woody" was written by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and released on his debut album, Bob Dylan, in 1962. The song conveys Dylan's appreciation of American folk legend Woody Guthrie. The song is one of two original compositions featured on Dylan's debut album. Dylan also rehearsed the song in a country arrangement during sessions for Self Portrait on May 1, 1970, as heard on the 2021 compilation album 1970.
Joel Rafael is an American singer-songwriter and folk musician from San Diego County, California. Rafael's second volume to celebrate the songs of Woody Guthrie, was released on Appleseed in 2005. The first volume, Woodeye, was released on Inside Recordings in 2003. Joel and his acoustic band have been performing and touring nationally since 1993. In 2000, the Joel Rafael Band, comprising Joel Rafael,, his daughter Jamaica, Carl Johnson and Jeff Berkley (ethno-percussion), released their third album, Hopper on Inside Recordings, an independent label created by Jackson Browne and his management. The album was nominated in 2001 for an Association For Independent Music (AFIM) Best Contemporary Folk award.
"Do Re Mi" is a folk song by American songwriter Woody Guthrie. The song deals with the experiences and reception of Dust Bowl migrants when they arrive in California. It is known for having two guitar parts, both recorded by Guthrie.
The Woody Guthrie Foundation, founded in 1972, is a non-profit organization which formerly served as administrator and caretaker of the Woody Guthrie Archives. The Foundation was originally based in Brooklyn, New York and directed by Woody Guthrie's daughter Nora Guthrie.
"On the Trail of the Buffalo", also known as "The Buffalo Skinners" or "The Hills of Mexico", is a traditional American folk song in the western music genre. It tells the story of an 1873 buffalo hunt on the southern plains. According to Fannie Eckstorm, 1873 is correct, as the year that professional buffalo hunters from Dodge City first entered the northern part of the Texas panhandle. It is thought to be based on the song Canaday-I-O.
Ramblin' Jack Elliott Sings Songs by Woody Guthrie and Jimmie Rodgers is an album by American folk musician Ramblin' Jack Elliott. It was released in 1960 in Great Britain and in 1962 in the US on the Monitor label.
Thinking of Woody Guthrie was released in 1969 by Vanguard Records and is the debut solo album of Country Joe McDonald, best known for his work with Country Joe & the Fish. It was a different approach by McDonald to release a folk music and country album in the style of Woody Guthrie. Prior to this solo release, he was known to make albums in a psychedelic style with his band. The album was a tribute to the work of Woody Guthrie, a country and folk musician who died two years earlier. All of the tracks on the album were either composed or performed by Guthrie. McDonald was heavily influenced by Guthrie since he was a child. McDonald could recall his interest of Guthrie came first when his parents played Guthrie's first album, Dust Bowl Ballads. Even though McDonald has issued several albums in his career, he looks to this album as the piece he is most proud of.
Woody At 100: The Woody Guthrie Centennial Collectionis a 150-page large-format book with three CDs containing 57 tracks, including Woody Guthrie's most important recordings such as the complete version of "This Land Is Your Land," "Pretty Boy Floyd," "I Ain't Got No Home in This World Anymore," and "Riding in My Car." The set also contains 21 previously unreleased performances and six never-before-heard original songs, including Woody's first known—and recently discovered—recordings. It is an in-depth commemorative collection of songs, photos and essays released by Smithsonian Folkways in June 2012.
The Woody Guthrie Center is a public museum and archive located in Tulsa, Oklahoma that is dedicated to the life and legacy of American folk musician and singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie. The Center also contains the archives of folk singer, songwriter, and fellow social activist Phil Ochs.
Bound for Glory is a 1956 album by Woody Guthrie and Will Geer. It consists of a selection of songs from Guthrie's Dust Bowl Ballads of 1940 and his Asch recordings of 1944–45, each introduced briefly by Geer with spoken relevant extracts from Guthrie's writings.
"Old Man Trump" is a song with lyrics written by American folk singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie in 1954. The song describes the racist housing practices and discriminatory rental policies of his landlord, Fred Trump. Although the lyrics were written in 1954, it was never recorded by Guthrie. In January 2016, Will Kaufman, a Guthrie scholar and professor of American literature and culture at the University of Central Lancashire, unearthed the handwritten lyrics while conducting research at the Woody Guthrie Archives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
"I Shall Be Free" is a song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. It was recorded on 6 December 1962 at Studio A, Columbia Recording Studios, New York, produced by John Hammond. The song was released as the closing track on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan on 27 May 1963, and has been viewed as a comedic counterpoint to the album's more serious material. Dylan has never performed the song in concert.