Ames Brothers - Night Train (2:24)
If the liner notes of this 1960 Ames Brothers LP are accurate, their version of Night Train represents the first vocal version of the song ever recorded. To be honest, until I found this record at the local Goodwill store a couple of weeks ago, I didn't know anyone had ever done a vocal version of the tune. Well, there's James Brown's spectacular 1962 King records version which has vocals but those consist mostly of the name of the song interspersed with city names and that's a different approach than the traditional verse-chorus technique employed here by the Ames Brothers.
The song was originally recorded by Jimmy Forrest in 1952 and loosely based on a riff cooked up by Duke Ellington's sax player Johnny Hodges, who used it on his 1940 release That's The Blues Old Man.
As for the Ames Brothers, you might scratch your head and wonder what the hell they (or their producers) were thinking as their smooth bland vocals don't mesh very well with the brooding and atmospheric instrumental track in the background. The whole thing is such a headscratcher, I thought I'd put it up for your listening enjoyment. Or misery.