Come ye ghost riders there’s nothing to fear
She’s rolling and the devil is the engineer
Hells the destination on this station stop
On the ghost train blowing into Blowing Rock

Ooooooh Ghost train
Ooooooh Ghost train…

Wait, I’m gonna put on my robe and conductor’s hat… OK here it comes…

“ALL ABOARD!”

(I’ve always wanted to do that…)

OK Hokeyfolk, so today we’re hopping aboard a spectral locomotive bound for parts unknown, with a one-way ticket to musical damnation and absolutely no idea who’s at the helm. Muahahahha.

Except that, beneath all the supernatural imagery, Ghost Train by the great Ketch Secor isn’t really about ghosts.

Or trains, for that matter.

And in terms of subject matter, it’s not even a Halloween song.

But bear with me here, because this is one wonderfully spooky little number in form if not function. I promise!

Ketch Secor, the irrepressible frontman of Old Crow Medicine Show, released Ghost Train on his 2025 solo album Story the Crow Told Me, a musical retelling of his early adventures with the band. The song draws inspiration from Old Crow’s unsuccessful audition at North Carolina’s Tweetsie Railroad amusement park, and their subsequent journey from scrappy street-corner buskers toward the hallowed stage of the Grand Ole Opry.

So, not exactly a supernatural tale of spectral passengers doomed to ride the rails for all eternity. But Sweet Jumpin’ Jars of Jalapeños, does it ever sound like one!

Ghost Train is a rip-roaring, foot-stomping excursion into vintage folk Americana, drenched in dusty Western imagery, ghostly apparitions, and just enough occult atmosphere to make the whole affair feel like a joyride through the underworld.

There’s an almost cinematic quality to the arrangement, with its galloping rhythms and old-time string-band exuberance conjuring images of skeletal cowboys, haunted frontier towns, and a runaway locomotive hurtling across a moonlit desert toward the gates of Hell.

And I really love that sharp, cracking punctuation at the end of each musical phrase. Sounds like somebody snapping a bullwhip over the heads of the damned, urging this supernatural runaway train toward its final destination.

It’s spooky. It’s playful. It’s ridiculously infectious. And there’s something deliciously sinister about music that sounds this cheerful while conjuring such wonderfully macabre imagery.

The way I see it — well, hear it I suppose — it feels like the soundtrack to a lost 1940s cowboy serial in which Gene Autry accidentally rides straight into Dante’s Inferno. Now I’m picturing Virgil rockin’ a mean fiddle. I like it.

So no, Ghost Train isn’t really about Halloween, ghosts, or trains. But sometimes the feeling of a song can be far more important than its literal meaning, and Ketch Secor has delivered a magnificently haunted little slice of Americana that fits our Halloween festivities just fine.

So climb aboard, folks. We’ve got a hell of a ride ahead of us, and the observation dome has a kickass view of Purgatorial Point!

Fast and fire-breathing like a burning flame
The dead go walking down the tracks again
Flying off the rails for a shady grove
Where Satan waits for you to sell your soul

Ooooooh Ghost train
Ooooooh Ghost train…