A song which encourages us to lay up treasures not on earth but in heaven is "This World Is Not My Home". The text and the tune are both of unknown origin. But it is believed by many to have come from the southern African-American spiritual tradition. The text is partly based on some Bible verses
Sometimes they are attributed to Albert Edward Brumley (1905-1977). Brumley made an arrangement of the song for his 1937 "Book Of Radio Favorites".
However, research has shown that the first appearance of the song seems to have been in "Joyful Meeting in Glory No. 1" (1919) edited by Bertha Davis and published by C. Miller of Mt. Sterling, KY.
Another arrangement was made by Jesse R. Baxter Jr. (1887-1960). It was published in the 1946 "Sentimental Songs" by the Stamps-Baxter Music and Printing Co. (although Baxter’s version seems to be just a rehashing of Brumley’s).
In the fall of 1938, at a migrant camp in California, Woody Guthrie would please the crowd with a version of the Carter Family's version of this song called "Can't Feel at Home".
But Guthrie wasn't very pleased with the hopeful passivity of the Carter Family's version, so he penned a parody of it titled "I Ain't Got No Home In This World Anymore", which considerably changes the tone of resigned worldly rejection of the original spiritual. The line "Angels beckon me to heaven's open door/And I can't feel at home in this world anymore," becomes "Rich man took my home and drove me from my door/And I ain't got no home in this world anymore."
In 1940 Guthrie recorded "I Ain't Got No Home In This World Anymore". (SEE FURTHER ON IN THIS TOPIC)
In December 1950, Woody signed a lease at the Beach Haven apartment complex in Brooklyn. He soon had bitter words for his landlord: Donald J. Trump’s father, Fred C. Trump, as unveiled by Will Kaufman a professor of American literature and culture at the University of Central Lancashire in Britain,
He wrote down these bitter words in a poem entitled: "Old Man Trump", suggesting that blacks were unwelcome as tenants in the Trump apartment complex, near Coney Island.
Guthrie never made a recording of his poem, but in 2016 three artists have collaborated to finish and produce "Old Man Trump".
The track was released by Firebrand Records just months after the lyrics were re-discovered and publicized. "Old Man Trump" was recorded by riot folk singer Ryan Harvey with Ani DiFranco and guitarist Tom Morello.
Ryan Harvey is responsible for this musical setting of "Old Man Trump", but the chorus of "Old Man Trump" is in fact a reworking of Guthrie's "I Ain’t Got No Home In This World Anymore".
But as I said above the song is much older (when Old Man Trump was Young Man Trump).
The first recording of this spiritual was made in 1924
Medicine Show performer Stovepipe N°1 (Sam Jones) used the same melody in his "Lord Don't You Know I Have No Friend Like You".
(o) Stovepipe No. 1 (1924) (as "Lord Don't You Know I Have No Friend Like You")
Recorded August 19, 1924 in New York
Released on Columbia 210-D
Lyrics Stovepipe version
Well someone beckons me heaven when I die
I'm on the way back to promised land
Oh Lord don't you know I have no friend like You
If heaven's not my home Lord what shall I do
You got a swi...... night, the old pal.... they died
I have no ways back to promised land
Oh Lord don't you know I have no friend like You
If heaven's not my home Lord what shall I do
Someone beckons me heaven when I die
I'm on their way back to promised land
Or here:
(c) Golden Echo Quartet (1927) (as "This World Is Not My Home")
Recorded April 1, 1927 in New York
Released on Columbia 14572-D
Or here:
(c) Jessie May Hill (1927) (as "This World Is Not My Home")
Recorded December 17, 1927
Released on Okeh 8546
Listen here:
(c) Carter Family (1931) (as "Can't Feel At Home")
Recorded May 26, 1931 in Charlotte, New Carolina
Released on Victor 23569
Lyrics Carter Family version
This world is not my home, I'm just passing through
My treasures and my hopes are all beyond the blue
Where many many friends and kindred have gone on before
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Over in Glory land, there is no dying there
The saints are shouting victory and singing everywhere
I hear the voice of them that I have heard before
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Oh, lord, you know I have no friend like you
If heaven's not my home, oh, lord, what would I do
Angels beckon me to heaven's open door
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Heaven's expecting me, that's one thing I know
I fixed it up with Jesus a long time ago
He will take me through though I am weak and poor
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Oh, I have a loving mother over in Glory land
I don't expect to stop until I shake her hand
She's gone on before, just waiting at heaven's door
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Oh, lord, you know I have no friend like you
If heaven's not my home, oh, lord, what would I do
Angels beckon me to heaven's open door
And I can't feel at home in this world anymore
Listen here:
(c) J.E. Mainer's Mountaineers (1935) (as "This World Is Not My Home")
Recorded August 6, 1935 in Atlanta, Georgia
Released on Bluebird B-6088
Listen here:
(c) Monroe Brothers (1936) (as "This World Is Not My Home")
Recorded February 17, 1936 in Charlotte, North Carolina
Released on Bluebird B-6309
Listen here:
(c) Edith and Sherman Collins (1938) (as "I Can't Feel At Home In This World Anymore")
Recorded March 11, 1938
Released on Decca 5635
Listen here:
(c) Woody Guthrie (1940) (as "I Ain't Got No Home In This World Anymore")
Recorded April 26, 1940 in Camden, New Jersey.
Released on Victor Records # 26624 as part of the 3-disc album "Dust Bowl Ballads Volume 2".
Lyrics of Woody Guthrie's version:
I ain't got no home, I'm just a-roamin' 'round
Just a wanderin' worker, I go from town to town
And the police make it hard wherever I may go
And I ain't got no home in this world anymore
My brothers and my sisters, they're stranded on this road
A hot and dusty road that a million feet of trod
Rich man took my home and drove me from my door
And I ain't got no home in this world anymore
Was a-farmin' on the shares and always I was poor
My crops I lay into the banker's store
My wife took down and died upon the cabin floor
And I ain't got no home in this world anymore
Now as I look around, it's mighty plain to see
This world is such a great and a funny place to be
Oh the gambling man is rich and the working man is poor
And I ain't got no home in this world anymore
Listen here
(c) Alphabetical Four (1941) (as "I Can't Feel At Home In This World Anymore")
Recorded April 7, 1941 in New York City
Released on Decca 7840
Listen here
(c) Bob Dylan (1961) (as "I Ain't Got No Home")
Recorded December 22, 1961 at Bonnie Beecher's Apartment (Minnesota Hotel) in Dinkytown. Dinkytown is a small 'student-centric' shopping and entertainment area just off of the campus of the University of Minnesota.
Listen here:
Or to a sample here: JunoPlayer
(c) Jim Reeves (1962) (as "This World Is Not My Home")
Recorded January 29, 1962 in Nashville, TN
Released on the album "We Thank Thee"
Also released in the UK on a 45 which became a posthumous hit.
(c) Bob Dylan and The Band (1968) (as "I Ain't Got No Home")
Bob Dylan and The Band, performing Woody Guthrie's "I Ain't Got No Home" live on January 20, 1968 at the Woody Guthrie Memorial Concert, Carnegie Hall, New York City. The concert was Dylan's first public appearance since his 1966 motorcycle accident.
(c) Bruce Springsteen (1988) (as "I Ain't Got No Home In This World Anymore")
Released in 1988 on tribute-lp "A Vision Shared"
Listen here:
(c) Ryan Harvey (2016) (as "Old Man Trump")
With Tom Morello (guitar and vocals) and Ani DiFranco (vocals)
Released in 2016 on Tom Morello and Ryan Harvey's own Firebrand Records
Harvey, who co-founded the national Riot-Folk collective in 2004, contacted Guthrie’s daughter, Nora, about using her father’s lyrics for a modern song against Donald Trump, reports Baltimore Magazine.
Listen here:
In 1927 The Kentucky Thoroughbreds recorded a song with the same title, but is in fact a different song.
(c) Kentucky Thoroughbreds (1927)
Recorded April 14, 1927 at Marsh Laboratories in Chicago, IL.
Released on Paramount 3014
Listen here:
Or here:
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