There is a moment after you set the needle down on an old 45, during the first few revolutions, when a muted and dusty crackle defines a world within those grooves. It persuades us to close our eyes and dig the sound. I have spent the last 16 years seeking out and playing for the world unique recorded music that is dark and lovely. I am especially pleased when I can find a piece of music that moves me enough to fit into one of my DJ sets.

Whether it is a love ballad, a barn burner or just an instrumental, the common ingredient that I appreciate is a high level of seriousness in the delivery. For me this means a certain balance of lyrics, voice and instrumentation that may not fit into my standard method of identifying and categorizing music. When it comes to my record shelves I call this category the “weird stack.” Deep within the weird stack resides a fantastic universe: the darkest and most interesting records on my shelves.

Among the records in this magical area are two that epitomize the sound of the weird stack, Chuck Berry’s “Down Bound Train” and Bo Diddley’s “The Great Grandfather”. Both tunes, written in the 1950s, focused on the dark side of American culture. While many of their popular songs were the usual radio-friendly rhythm & blues, there was something undeniably sinister stirring in the words and music.

In 1956 Chuck Berry recorded a song for the Chess label titled “Down Bound Train” (Chess 1615). It was the b-side to “No Money Down” and it featured Willie Dixon on bass, Otis Spann on piano and Eddie Hardy on drums. This was the tale of an alcoholic’s nightmare trip to hell, after a night of drinking too much hooch that ended with blacking out on the floor. When faced with eternal damnation, the nameless drunk realizes he shares the same horrible fate as his fellow passengers, but before he arrives at his fiery destination he discovers he may have a choice in the matter after all, and that he could struggle to redeem himself before it’s too late.

The gravity of the situation is evident in the descriptions of his fellow riders: “The passengers were mostly a motley crew; some were foreigners and others he knew. Rich men in broadcloth, beggars in rags, handsome young ladies and wicked old hags.” We can taste and smell the interior of the train: “The engine with blood was sweaty and damp and brilliantly lit with a brimstone lamp, and imps for fuel were shoveling bones while the furnace rang with a thousand groans.” We sense that American culture’s seedy underbelly of culture will not likely escape this nightmare and so the unceasing motion of the engine drags us furiously along for the ride.

Out of a mist of darkness the tracks hum with a furious rhythm, the click-clack of the sticks and the echo of fingers upon bass strings draws each instrument out of this mysterious dream at an ever increasing intensity “As the train rushed on at a terrible pace sulphuric fumes burned their hands and face, wider and wider the country grew, faster and faster the engine flew. Louder and louder the thunder crashed, brighter and brighter the lightning flashed.” The anxiety of the experience leaves us desperate to be anywhere else, but the devil himself has other plans in mind for us. As a result, we succumb to the situation so as not to prolong our imminent suffering.

Three years later in 1959 Bo Diddley recorded a Dave Bartholomew tune for the Checker label called “The Great Grandfather”. This was the flipside to a popular number called “Crackin’ Up” (Checker 924) featuring Willie Dixon on bass, Lafayette Leake on piano and either Clifton James (or Frank Kirkland) on drums. The tune was a deeply haunted tale burdened with the hard times experienced by a man surviving out in the country in the 1800s. There was a depth and substance to the minimal atmosphere of the music that suggested that this was no love song and was certainly unlikely to be played at the local record hop.

It begins with a solitary guitar string and a single sad drum, heavy with the steps of hard tired men, the drumsticks cracking like bones under skin. Within a faded glance, cracked fingers tap somberly on a piano lonely like men crying alone. The deep steady slap of the bass draws the great-grandfather forward into the earth; soon a broken voice bears the weight of the story “the great grand-pappy when the land was young barred his do’ wit’ a wagon tongue, oh ohh, when the times got tough and the Redskins smart said his prayers wit his shotgun cocked oh ohh..”

In the lyrics we are reminded that people in the early days of this country experienced hardships and fears that are hard for us to imagine today, such as bolting the door of the shack with part of a wagon and protecting oneself with only a 12-gauge shotgun. As the tune creeps along ponderously, the dirt under the nails begins to show as we soon learn that the great grand-pappy cleaned his teeth with his knife, only owned one suit and was blessed with 21 children in his lifetime.

It is clear that the early tradition of the blues paved the way for music with this kind of substance and meaning. A popular artist didn’t have to stick to accepted ideas of American music culture and this philosophy still stands today. After 40 years these two songs hold more weight than most popular tunes being recorded today and they have certainly earned their honorable place among the weird stack.