(11-03-2016 09:15 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  



Artist: Steve Goodman
Album: released as a single. No Big Surprise (1994) was the first album to include the song.
Cut: "Go Cubs Go!"
1984 Red Pajamas Records

Steven Benjamin Goodman (July 25, 1948 – September 20, 1984) – known as Steve Goodman – was an American folk music singer-songwriter from Chicago. He wrote the song "City of New Orleans," which was recorded by Arlo Guthrie and Willie Nelson. He also penned "Go Cubs Go!." He wrote "Go, Cubs, Go" out of spite after then GM Dallas Green called "A Dying Cub Fan's Last Request" too depressing. The Cubs songs grew out of his fanatical devotion to the team, which included many clubhouse and on-field visits with Cubs players. In 1974, singer David Allan Coe achieved considerable success on the country charts with Goodman's and John Prine's "You Never Even Called Me by My Name", a song which good-naturedly spoofed stereotypical country music lyrics. Prine refused to take a songwriter's credit of the song, although Goodman bought Prine a jukebox as a gift from his publishing royalties. Goodman's name is mentioned in Coe's recording of the song, in a spoken epilogue in which Goodman and Coe discuss the merits of "the perfect country and western song." Goodman died of leukemia in September 1984 and his song was given a Grammy Award in 1985.