Last Thing on My Mind

**fatt-dad** · Dec-01-2004, 7:01pm

So, I was playing with a weekly group (doing a poor job at that too, alas another story) and the guitar player started up the song with the lyrics, "are you going away with no words of farewell, could there be not a trace left behind you. I could have loved you better, didn't mean to be unkind, you know that was the last thing on my mind" or something like that. Well, I know that song from decades ago, I just cannot for the life of me recall how I know it. Peter, Paul and Mary, Hoyt Axton, who made this popular?

Comments?

fatt-dad

**djweiss** · Dec-01-2004, 7:05pm

I have recordings of both Doc Watson and Tony Rice doing that song...I belive Tom Paxton wrote it.

**Dennis Schubert** · Dec-01-2004, 7:33pm

This was also one of the great duets that Dolly Parton cut with Porter Waggoner, before they split up.

**Ken Berner** · Dec-01-2004, 7:45pm

The Judy Collins version was about the best I ever heard; Tom Paxton DID write this song!

**mmukav** · Dec-01-2004, 7:50pm

Tom Paxton wrote it, performed it, and does the best version of it I've ever heard!

**mrbook** · Dec-01-2004, 8:00pm

Tom Paxton wrote it, everybody has done it, including the Kentucky Colonels on one of the live Rounder albums from the 70s.

**Garrett** · Dec-01-2004, 9:27pm

Best version I know is Charley Pride.

**fatt-dad** · Dec-01-2004, 9:33pm

Well, I remain flumoxed. I can hear the Judy Collins version (forgot about it - ha) and the Doc Watson version, but somewhere in the back of my mind, neither seem the most familiar to my memory. I doubt that the Tom Paxton version would be what I was exposed to in the 60/70s.

Let me get one thing right, is the title "last thing on my mind"? I may just do some research to see whether I can figure out the cover version that I am trying to conger up.

Thanks everybody! I will go look for the Tom Paxton version, to start at the source as I begin my travel down memory lane.

f-d

**BluegrassPhilfromFrance** · Dec-02-2004, 2:34am

Another nice bluegrass version is by the White Brothers (Clarence & Roland)aka The New Kentucky Colonels Live in Sweden 1973 (Rounder Records 0073)

**Martin Jonas** · Dec-02-2004, 4:55am

The Tom Paxton version was on his 1964 album "Ramblin' Boy". That album is now available as twofer with his second album "Ain't That News", but as a UK issue only (import in the US). The same version is also on the Rhino Elektra "Best of Tom Paxton: I Can't Help But Wonder Where I'm Bound" (a pretty good CD anyway). Paxton has re-recorded the song about a hundred times since, both live and in the studio: the best of these later versions is on "Even A Gray Day", accompanied by David Bromberg.

The Judy Collins version actually predates the Paxton version, if only by a few months: it's on her 1964 "Concert" album, which also includes Paxton's "Ramblin' Boy". Paxton got his recording contract with Elektra (Collins' label) because of the success of the Collins version.

There are several dozen other cover versions. An incomplete list from allmusic.com includes:

Chet Atkins
Joan Baez
Banamarama
Glen Campbell
Gene Clark
Rick Danko
Sandy Denny
Neil Diamond
Rodney Dillard
Marianne Faithful
Jose Feliciano
Flatt & Scruggs
The Kentucky Colonels
The Kingston Trio
Hank Locklin
Patty Loveless
The Chad Mitchell Trio
Nana Mouskouri
The Move
Anne Murray
Willie Nelson
Gram Parsons
Dolly Parton
Herb Pedersen
Peter, Paul & Mary
Charley Pride
LeAnn Rimes
Earl Scruggs
The Seekers
Porter Wagoner
Doc Watson
Clarence White

You get the idea. It's probably safe to say that this song forms the basis for Tom's pension fund.

Martin

**Scotti Adams** · Dec-02-2004, 5:10am

Herb Pederson gets my nod for the best cut of it..

**AlanN** · Dec-02-2004, 5:48am

Keith Whitley and Jimmy Gaudreau nailed the harmonies here.

**jim simpson** · Dec-02-2004, 7:30am

One of my favorite versions is by Frank Wakefield on That Was Now ... This Is Then. He does it instumentally.

**fatt-dad** · Dec-02-2004, 8:20am

So, it's the voice of Bromburg that I heard in my mind. That said, the connection to the Kingston and Chad Mitchell trios is in my upbringing also (my older sisters loved these guys).

Thanks!

fatt-dad

**sunburst** · Dec-02-2004, 8:57am

I haven't seen any mention of Tony Rice's solo version from Church Street Blues back when his singing voice was still intact.
I think it's a good version.

**JDARTGOD** · Dec-02-2004, 9:33am

Tom Paxton wrote it.

My favorite version is Tony Rice's as mentioned above. Very simple and very pure.

**Moose** · Dec-02-2004, 10:12am

Hey Ironweed! - Porter and Dolly! - now waddn't they somthin'!! - "Last Thing on My Mind" - ya' beat me to it..!! What beautiful music they created - what a combination - do ya' think there was anything "between em'...!? - my personal favorite was "Jeanie's Afraid of the Dark" - Sorry to digress but I thought I was the only person that remembers... Now back to our regularly scheduled broadcast.. Regards, Moose.

**GVD** · Dec-02-2004, 11:40am

Leave it to Moose to come up with the definitive version.

#Porter and Dolly's version is the first and last thing on my mind when I think of that song.

GVD

**John S** · Dec-02-2004, 12:26pm

Unless I missed it, nobody mentioned that Chesapeake recorded this tune. Jimmy Gaudreau on mandolin.

**Frank Russell** · Dec-02-2004, 1:48pm

And Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute.

**Moose** · Dec-02-2004, 1:58pm

Yes! - I heard him(?) perform it on the Grand 'ol Opry ;... got TWO encores... ; he recorded that one on the Victor label... ; Victor Schwartz....had a tape recorder in his cellar.