Green Light on the Southern, released in 2011 on Plectrafone (the offshoot of Western Jubilee Recording that Blake had launched in 2010), is a Norman Blake railroad-themed album made after his withdrawal from touring. Blake plays guitar and sings; Nancy Blake adds harmony on selected tracks. The seventeen-track set works low-key old-time and stringband material, mostly traditional songs Blake had learned as a boy from 1920s and 1930s recordings. The album is titled for the Alabama Great Southern Railway, and the title track recalls Blake's 1940s summer days along the Southern Railroad in Sulphur Springs, Georgia. The repertoire includes "Railroading on the Great Divide" — an A.P. Carter Family song from 1952 — alongside "The Wreck on the C&O," tying Blake's living memory to the railroad-disaster ballad tradition.
Tracklist
- 1 Roll on Buddy alt version 3:50
- 2 Goodbye to the Plains 3:08
- 3 Little Bunch of Roses 3:00
- 4 The Tramp 2:55
- 5 Hawaiian Mother O'Mine 3:24
- 6 The Old Wooden Rocker 3:53
- 7 Railroading on the Great Divide 2:54
- 8 Steel Guitar Chimes 3:55
- 9 Have No Desire to Roam 3:08
- 10 Green Light on the Southern alt version 2:51
- 11 Fifteen Miles from Birmingham 3:33
- 12 The Wreck on the C&O 3:59
- 13 He Rambled 4:01
- 14 Whistling Rufus alt version 2:07
- 15 Goobye Dear Old Stepstone 5:00
- 16 Bandit Cole Younger 4:19
- 17 The New Spanish Two Step 3:23
