Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Midnight Special.” What does it mean?
It’s a song about a man in prison.
Well, you wake up in the mornin’, you hear the work bell ring,
And they march you to the table to see the same old thing.
Ain’t no food upon the table, and no pork up in the pan.
But you better not complain, boy, you get in trouble with the man.
Work crew, of course. The next verse talks about Miss Rosie, who is trying to get a pardon for her husband. The final verse is a warning about how to behave in Houston.
The Modnight Special was a train that would pass by the prison. Prisoners would imagine that it was taking them to freedom. Hughie Ledbetter knew the area personally.
No, the Modnight Special is the train on which Banned Dopers are run out of town. 
That would be Huddie Ledbetter, better known to the world as Leadbelly. The song may very well have been written long before he got hold of it, while he was in Angola Prison in Mississippi. I’ve heard a thousand other versions of it (even a few other Leadbelly versions,) but Leadbelly’s original recording was the definitive version, and the one that CCR was covering.
Sorry. My blues lore is getting rusty. He spent time in the Texas prison system, then in the Louisiana State Pen (Angola.) This is where Alan Lomax (the great music folklorist) discovered him. Google “Leadbelly” and “Alan Lomax” and you’ll have a lifetime of reading on the subject. Both men are the subjects of countless myths and legends of blues and folk music. Read, for example, the legend of how Leadbelly sang his way out of the Texas prison system.
Leadbelly was an absolute master musician, by the way.
No kidding. I can’t believe I made that typo…the price for posting before coffee, I guess.
How many great blues recordings do we lose every time we switch formats (78 to LP, LP to CD, etc.)?
And then, later, sang his way out of the Louisiana prision system.
Shit, if I could get out of prison because of my musical talent, I’d probably find a couple dudes to kill just on principle. 
–Cliffy
…with a little help. 
Good point. I’d never thought of it quite that way. He sang his way out of an attempted murder conviction (not to mention one or two additional attacks on fellow inmates and guards.)
errr, that should be, “sang his way out of a murder conviction and a prison break, assault, and attempted murder.”
Vicious bastard, but man, could he ever sing and play.
I have all of the above; never give up a turntable!
But the number of blues songs out now from the 20s and 30s actually far exceeds the number out at the time. Thousands of previously unreleased songs and alternate versions have been released on CD, especially in the last 5-10 years. (The same is also true of psych rock of the 60s & other genres that atavistic collector geeks like me crave constant new doses of…)