It Took Half an Hour to Write
As opposed to the songs that sometimes took him five or six years to make, Runaway Train came to him quickly. In fact, it took him a mere half-hour to write it. After writing it, he showed it to the band, and they liked it. “It was really the first time I wrote a song, and people had an immediate reaction.”
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Pirner said he didn’t really understand why people were so taken aback by the song. “I was too naïve to realize they were all seeing dollar signs.” Soul Asylum was a shabby-looking quartet of ex-punks from Minneapolis. They would play melodic, roots-rock that had touching honesty and often an uplifting message.