Vince Gill Chooses Love on ‘I Don’t Wanna Ride the Rails No More’
New album Okie comes out August 23.
Country Music Hall of Fame member Vince Gill offers a classic slice of tenderness with the new track, “I Don’t Wanna Ride the Rails No More.”
Quiet and deliberate, with its steam-powered rhythm chugging along and stoked by acoustic guitar, Gill’s long-loved vocal slips comfortably into a timeless story for the track. It’s all about giving up life on the run for one more shot at love, and marks the third teaser released from Gill’s upcoming Okie album. The Grammy-winning icon wrote it himself, and after a lifetime of travel, he says it’s a theme he can relate to personally.
“The whole image of riding a train has such great beauty to it,” Gill explains. “It conjures images of The Grapes of Wrath, the Dust Bowl, and people hopping freight trains. This song has got to come from my experience in order to be able to put it on paper and to have it feel legit and truthful and honest. In my case it could very well be about a bus instead of a train — I’ve been riding a tour bus for 40 something years now. This is a song of reflection, yearning and hopefulness.”
“I don’t wanna ride the rails no more / I wanna know a woman’s love worth dying for / Hear children playing through an old screen door / No, I don’t wanna ride the rails no more,” he sings in the heartwarming chorus.
Gill’s Okie album is set for release on August 23. He just finished up a European run of Eagles shows with the classic rock giants, and will perform at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium as part of Bluegrass Nights at the Ryman on July 25.
