Joan Baez
Baez's rendition of this traditional folk ballad tells the story of a woman ruined by a New Orleans house of ill repute, framing…
ruin and moral downfall warning and cautionary storytelling regret
Johnny Cash
A prisoner in California listens to a passing freight train and measures his life against it. Over four short verses he moves…
incarceration freedom and mobility guilt and remorse
Aretha Franklin
Aretha Franklin's 1967 reworking of Otis Redding's song turns a man's plea for domestic deference into a woman's non-negotiable…
demanding respect sexual and economic bargaining power gender and domestic power