"New Timer" is a song by Bruce Springsteen from his 1995 album The Ghost of Tom Joad. Springsteen performs the song solo on the album, with only guitar accompaniment.The narrator of the song is a man who has left behind a wife and children in Pennsylvania in order to find work, but ends up becoming a hobo, riding on freight trains. He tells of an older man, Frank, who has been riding the rails since the Great Depression and serves as a protector and mentor to the narrator.