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Highway History
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Look out pretty mama
I'm on the road again.
Drivin' in a beat up car
The highway is long but we've come so far
Two thousand miles from home
We got to find someplace that we can belong
But, we know, the freeways in life
Are all pointing us home
Don't you know, nothing in this life means anymore
Freeways, freeways.
Back on the road again
Right back where we really always been
Same old hotel rooms
Back on the road again.
Sometimes I feel so all alone
That ain't no place to be
I wish I had my feet under the table
A little child on my knee
Highway call
There's something in your song
Highway call
You keep me rollin' on.
Man, will you look at that sweet two wheeler.
Gotta keep moving on open road
Gotta keep moving on open road
All I see is open road
Miles and miles of open road
Keep moving on open road.
Gotta keep moving on open road
Gone, gone.
People don't pick you up on the blue highway
Oh the blue highway is a road you travel alone
People sure ain't gonna look you up on the blue highway
On the blue highway just keeps leadin' you on.
You know that goddam road seemed like it went on forever
Exhaust fumes made our eyes turn red and swell.
With our clothes stuck to the seat and to our bodies
It was a stinking summer trip through southern hell.
Rolling down 295 out of Portland, Maine
Still high from the people up there and feeling no pain
Gonna make it to New Jersey, gonna set it up and do it again.
I'm going to rent myself a house
In the shade of the freeway.
I'm going to pack my lunch in the morning
And go to work each day.
And when the evening rolls around
I'll go on home and lay my body down.
Highways and dancehalls
A good song takes you far
You write about the moon
And you dream about the stars
Blues in old motel rooms
Girls in daddy's car
You sing about the nights
And you laugh about the scars.
I'm just rolling away from yesterday
Behind the wheel of a stolen Chevrolet
I'm going to get a little higher
And see if I can hot-wire reality.
Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels
Looking back at the years gone by like so many summer fields
In sixty-five I was seventeen and running up one-o-one
I don't know where I'm running now, I'm just running on.
And I've followed those highway signs
And I've run down those thin white lines
Like those drivers this old road is all I call my own
That's a big ten-four
From your back door
Just put that hammer down
This young man feels
Those eighteen wheels
That keep turning 'round to take me down to shaky town.
We're driving down the highway
Seven days a week
Looking for a number 1
Looking rather bleak.
Well, I'm a roadie
What a job being a roadie.
Take a hint from your mama, please don't cry no more.
Cause it's soon one morning down the road I'm gone
But I ain't goin' down that long ol' lonesome road all by myself
If I can't carry you, baby, going to carry somebody else.
I had a wife, she wouldn't keep me
Left a job, a living, and family
There was nothing to keep me, no reason to stay
Went looking for nothing down the blue highway.
Well I never have wandered down to New Orleans
Never have drifted down a bayou stream
But I heard that music on the radio
And I swore some day I was gonna go
Down highway 10 past Lafayette
To Baton Rouge and I won't forget
To send you a card with my regrets
'cause I'm never gonna come back home.
A few more cigarettes now honey
One more jolt of joe
A couple hours past New York City
A few more turnpike tolls
One more minute away from you
Is a minute that lasts too long.
A road is only dust and dirt.
On a lonely interchange
The signs all look the same
'cause a road is just a road
and a feeling's just a feeling.
No matter where you go,
from Waterloo to Wichita
A road is just a road
that the one you love is leaving on.
And the stones in the road fly out from beneath our wheels
Another day, another deal, before we get back home
And the stones in the road leave a mark from whence they came
A thousand points of light or shame, baby, I don't know.
Going 90 miles an hour with her hair on fire
Running on a tank full of burning desire
She's heading out on highway number 29
Leaving Loachapoka, Alabama, behind.
I found a real cute baby
she's a real swinging baby
And she says we'll go steady
just as soon as I get me a hot rod.
I'm going to take her for a moonlight drive
Across Mulholland Drive
Man I will be really alive
As soon as I get me a hot rod.
Another highway, another heartache
Traveling man routine eight days from home
And all alone in the whining time machine . . .
On this blue highway
Between love and me
Nothing but blue highway
As far as my heart can see
I'm driving down the Highway of the Saints
Keepin' an eye on a friend of mine
Who wishes no complaints
When all her strength had left her
And hope it become thin.
We're gonna fly ya ya yeah
Ninety miles an hour
Swervin' all over the road
Hundred miles an hour
My hand's on the radio
Baby's in the back seat
Bompin' all over the road.
Was ridin' along side the highway,
Rollin' up the country side.
Thinkin' I'm the devil's heatwave,
What you burn in your crazy mind?
Saw a slight distraction standin' by the road;
She was smilin' there, yellow in her hair;
Do you wanna, I was thinkin', would you care.
There's a storm across the valley, clouds are rollin' in
The afternoon is heavy on your shoulders
There's a truck out on the four lane a mile or more away
The whinin' of his wheels just makes it colder
He's an hour away from ridin' on your prayers up in the sky
And ten days on the road are barely gone
There's a fire softly burnin', supper's on the stove
But it's the light in your eyes that makes him warm.
I hear her voice
In the mornin' hour she calls me
The radio reminds me of my home far away
And drivin' down the road I get a feelin'
That I should have been home yesterday, yesterday
Country roads, take me home
To the place I belong
West Virginia, mountain momma
Take me home, country roads.
She's the light that leads him on
Well he tried to tell her late that night
But she was down the road and gone.
End of the road
End of the line
End of everything I thought was mine
End of the story of sadness and laughter
Time to get down to the happy ever after
Been looking down the road where all my dreams have come undone
Feels like the end of something but it's only just begun.
Gonna take that blue highway
And leave this sorry town
Stayed too long, but now I'm gone
And I know where I'm bound
I don't wanna take the interstate
It represents all the things I hate
I'm rolling down that blue highway.
A long time ago came a man on a track
Walking thirty miles with a sac on his back
And he put down his load where he thought it was the best
And he made a home in the wilderness
He built a cabin and a winter store
And he ploughed up the ground by the cold lake shore
And the other travellers came riding down the track
And they never went further and they never went back
Then came the churches then came the schools
Then came the lawyers then came the rules
Then came the trains and trucks with their loads
And the dirty old track was the telegraph road
I was trashed, ridin' on my 74
Goin' out to even the score
She pulled the top down on her convertible
I've got a lot of miles to cover
But if you think you need a lover
All right
Climb on, hold tight, I got a long ride tonight.
The moonlight night, the highway shines.
A pair of beams approaches mine
And as she pulls up close we share a glance
My heart awoke
The blonde in the blue T-Bird
500 miles to L.A.
500 Miles to my home
When I get back to L.A.
Never again will I roam
Surfin' and drivin' are the only things I know.
When I get my wheels
Won't see me around
When I get my wheel
Gonna be freeway bound.
Black skies above me
And the concrete down below my feet
At night I'm blinded by the headlights
And the mountain roads are steep.
Two thousand more miles to bear
And I'll be there.
We've all got wheels to take ourselves away
We've got telephones to say what we can't say
We've all got higher and higher every day
Come on wheels take this boy away
We're not afraid to ride
We're not afraid to die
So come on wheels take me home today.
He got the voices speak in riddles, he got the eye as black as coal,
He got a suitcase covered with rattlesnake hide, and he stands right in the road.
You got to hidey-hide, you got to jump up run away;
You got to hidey-hidey-hide, the old man is down the road.
Sitting in traffic on the Tappan Zee
Fifty million people out in front of me
Trying to cross the water but it just might be a while
Rain's coming down I can't see a thing
Radio's broken so I'm whistling
New York to Nyack feels like a hundred miles.
Hey Sweet Annie
Don't take it so bad
You know the summer's coming soon
Though the interstate is choking under salt and dirty sand
And it seems the sun is hiding from the moon.
Goin' ridin' on the freeway of love
Wind's against our back
Goin' ridin' on the freeway of love
In my pink Cadillac.
It was a long was for this high road
It was a far way from here
So we walked along the road
Just telling stories as we go.
Well I left my home in Vicksburg
and started traveling north.
Made it to New Orleans as the bus was taking off.
The citizens' committee was giving away the fare
Saying,"If you don't like the south, boy, just ride on outta here."
Ride on, ride on Red, ride on,
Gonna ride off to my freedom
And make those Northern States my home.
First time I met old Turnpike Tom
Sittin' in a diner in Bloomington
He said "Are you going my way?"
He had a sleeping bag and a hat that's torn
Both his thumbs were two feet long
From years of hitchin' on the hi-way.
He said "Mister, won't you give me a ride?
I'm a wanted man lookin' for a place to hide."
I was born a poor, poor man
All my life I've had hard workin' hands
But I sang my song as I carried my load
Cause I had a dream about Rainbow, Rainbow Road.
A green shirt, muddy shoes
I'm waiting on the bus to get me through
Going to El Paso
I'm going to El Paso
I'm going to El Paso.
Write me up for 125
Post my face, wanted dead or alive
Take my license, all that jive
I CAN'T DRIVE 55!
Trans AM, come on
Catch me if you can
In my Trans AM
Highway Wonderland.
They were on their way to the other side of town
They tried to beat a freight train
And the freight train ran 'em down
Highway 54 took my love away from me
But I knew she didn't want me
But I couldn't set her free
Lonesome taillights light the long night
Take me with you into town
Take me somewhere I can be someone
You're looking at somebody
Big city bound
I'm going to get up in the morning,
Goin' down Highway 51.
Get up in the morning,
Goin' Down Highway 51.
Miss Sally Mae's my sweet woman,
And she don't pay me no mind.
Maybe we'll make Texas by the morning
Light the bayou with our tail lights in the night
800 miles to El Paso from the state line
And we never have the money for the flight
I'm in the back seat sleepy from the travel
We played our hearts out all night long in New Orleans
And I'm dirty from the diesel fumes, drinking coffee black
When the first breath of Texas comes in clean
And there's something bout the southland in the springtime
I'm gonna head up on to old Ferguson Road
Find myself a spot where the sun shines through
I'll throw some old mattress in the back of my bus
And get a good head start on forgetting you.
One more song about moving along the highway
Can't say much of anything that's new.
If I could only work this life out my way
I'd rather spend it being close to you.
The city streets are wet again with rain
But I'm walkin' just the same
Skies turn to the usual grey
When you turn to face the day
And love don't show up in the pavement cracks
All my water colours fade to black
I'm goin' nowhere and I'm ten steps back
All my dreams have fallen flat.
Carefree highway, let me slip away on you
Carefree highway, you seen better days
The mornin' after blues from my head down to my shoes
Carefree highway, let me slip away
Slip away on you.
Bottles, beads, and cigarettes
And lovers that I ain't found yet
Pickin' with a friend till dawn
And singing all of those hi'way songs.
I would gladly offer you my love
In this hotel in somewhere U.S.A.
This rental car never went so far
But with each passing mile one more dream has turned to clay
Where the road runs down by the butternut grove
To old Bill Skinner's stream
Do tell at the noonday bell
It's time for a summertime dream.
Going down to Richmond
Going down to Durham
Going down to Gainesville
Feel like I'm rolling into view.
Don't you listen to
That old wind blow
There's a storm cloud rolling
Down the Clovis Highway
It's heading my way
And I just might go
What keeps these wheels in motion
What keeps me alive, you know
Everything's gonna be alright
As long as I've got this drive.
I feel like I've been on the move too long
Eight years of on the road
Got me a place in the burning sun
Found me the way to go
I'm building up a house to make a home.
Took the car and drove it everywhere
Through the land where all the West began
Desert wind was blowing in our hair
Me and Nancy running hand in hand.
Speed along the highway, honey I want it my way
But listen to her daddy's song, don't stay out too long
Were just busy hidin', sitting in the back seat of my car.
Why don't we drive in the rain
Straight to the eye of the hurricane
Go for a ride in the driving rain
Said farewell to my last hotel
It never was much kind of abode
Glasgow town never brought me down
When I was heading out on the road
Carlisle city never looked so pretty,
And the Kendal Freeway is fast
Slow down driver,
Wanna stay alive,
I wanna make this journey last.
Another hot one
Out on highway eleven
This is my life.
It's what I've chosen to do.
There are no free rides.
No one said it'd be easy.
There's a black man with a black cat
Living in a black neighbourhood
He's got an interstate runnin' through his front yard
You know, he thinks, that he's got it so good.
Bye bye love, I'll catch you later
Got a lead foot down on my accelerator and the rearview mirror torn off.
I ain't never lookin' back. And that's a fact.
I've tried all I can imagine
I've begged and pleaded in true lover's fashion
I've got pride, I'm takin' it for a ride
Bye bye, bye bye my baby, bye bye
Don't think all those tears are gonna hold me here like they've done before
You'll find what's left of us in a cloud of dust on highway 4.
Eight o'clock
And I'm gettin' out
I'm goin' crazy
Hangin' round the house
Tryin' to start my car up
Try to keep it runnin' right to you.
Rose Anna's daddy
Had a car she loved to drive.
She stole the keys one night
And took me for a ride
Turned up the music
Just as loud as it could go
Blew out the speakers on her daddy's radio.
Well I was driving up the highway
Thinking about I don't know what in particular
What riot I would find when I got to Berkeley, I suppose
When I noticed these strange vibrations
Or was I falling in love?
I set out on the narrow way
Many years ago,
Hoping I would find true love
Along the broken road.
I got lost a time or two,
Wiped my brow, kept pushing through
I couldn't see how every sign pointed straight to you.
El Dorado fins, whitewalls and skirts;
Rides just like a little bit of heaven here on earth.
When I die, buddy, throw my body in the back,
Take me to the junkyard in my Cadillac.
On the road again
I'm a coming home to you.
Picking you up on the way out of town
That old hill country road trip feeling is a coming around.
We're going cruising down U.S. 281
Every two stepping skinny dippin soakin up sun
With the top down getting brown
Ain't it good to be alive.
Running for the record
Running for the money
Starring in the picture show,
These wheels, they got me running.
Marking my time in the pages of history
Rocking down the Tennessee Road.
Well I'm walkin' down the road
With my hat on my head
Had to leave my momma in my big brass bed
And the sun is shinin' on me
And you know it sure feels fine.
Get on the blue highways
Follow the blue highways
You know they they're there
Where the real America lies.
It's a long day living in Reseda
There's a freeway runnin' through the yard
And I'm a bad boy cause I don't even miss her
I'm a bad boy for breakin' her heart.
Well they put me out on the old kings road
I didn't know which way to go
There was people all around wearin' funny lookin' clothes
Some boys, some girls, some I don't know
I didn't know which way to go
I'm a new world boy on the old Kings Road.
Now come on baby, get in the road
Oh come on now, in the middle of the road, yeah.
In the middle of the road you see the darnedest things
Like fat guys driving 'round in jeeps through the city
Wearing big diamond rings and silk suits
Past corrugated tin shacks full up with kids.
As I drove down on 65
I's cruising down that old Grapevine
Well, I must have been doing about at least 95
Well, out there on the side of the road all broke down
Who do you think was standing around
But the greatest country singer alive,
I'll fix your flat tire, Merle.
Get off this two-lane highway
It's going my way
Moving fast
Two-lane highway
It's taking me home at last.
She throws her hair into the February breeze
She hears it singing through the branches of the trees
A song of something you know so well
And she's still looking for a freeway.
Warm winds blowing
Heating blue sky
And a road that goes forever
I'm going to Texas
I'm back on the road again, it's time I leave you now
And maybe I'll see you next time, that I'm around
Until then I hope your happy baby and good times come your way
I'm back on the road again, I'm on my way.
The rainbow life from show to show
The smiling faces come and go
There's years of road and highway signs
And the hours go on for miles and miles . . . .
Don't care if the weight is heavy
The rocks are in the road
Your feet are flat, your engine's burn
You've got to pull your load.
I jumped at it when I had the chance
I joined the army and went to France
At Roosevelt's request.
Two weeks sitting in the mud
Made me lie to the man that
I could drive a truck for the Red Ball Express
All we do is keep it rollin' on
Trading bodies for petroleum
Winding road when I'm driving it home
Each and every turn
Had enough of the way I was
Seems like by now it's time to learn the way.
There's a highway
A lonesome stretch of gray
It runs between us
And takes me far away.
I'm empty and aching and I don't know why
Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike
They've all gone to look for America
All gone to look for America
All gone to look for America
They call me Baby Driver
And once upon a pair of wheels
Hit the road and I'm gone.
What's my number?
I wonder how your engine feels
Scoot down the road
What's my number
I wonder how your engine feels.
I was wrong
It took too long
I got caught in a rush hour.
Fellows started to shower
You with love and affection
Now you won't look in my direction
On the expressway to your heart
That expressway that's the best way.
I got a gig in Vegas and I ain't looking back
Oh, sweet baby, the money we'll be making
It was 40 miles from Vegas when we all started praying.
40 miles from Vegas and we all started praying
I've been giving what the road's been taking
40 miles from Vegas and we all started praying.
She like dancing to the peppermint man
Wearing high heels in a fine brown tan
She was hot, but that car was so fine
And all I wanna to is drive, drive, drive
69, 9, 9, 69
Like a drive down a dusty highway
After the sun's gone down
Chasing shadows into the new day
Leavin' this lonely town
I'm gonna rock-ride nothing to hide
Let the headlights guide me
I'm gonna roll right into the night
Take the midnight highway.
He watched the sun set on the highway
Headlights shinin' at the moon
The evening dropped a silent curtain
As the sky turned to a deeper blue
He parks his car along the road
To breathe the desert air
Told himself that he'd forget
She's no longer there.
I'll meet you downtown at the stroke of midnight
Wait out on the corner 'til I blink my headlights.
Let's drive across the desert 'til
We hit the high ground
And we're picking up a station
That's got a good drum sound
No need to hang around
When the party's over
They got another party going on
Down the road.
Green lights are the way to nowhere
Half the fun is in the getting there
And once you've figured that out
You're on your way.
Well hello there Austin
You look to be just fine
Pardon me San Marcos
But I'm a trying to make some time
There's a storm in my rear view
And a city on my left
There's a piece of mind in the straightaway
And there's comfort in the curves
Get your motor running
Head out on the highway
Looking for adventure
In whatever comes our way.
Well I left my happy home to see what I could find out.
I left my folk and friends with the aim to clear my mind out.
Well I hit the rowdy road and many kinds I met there
Many stories told me of the way to get there.
Well from Seattle to Macon
From Detroit to the Rio Grande
Ten thousand miles is a Sunday ride
With a big rig in my hands.
My right arm's strong as a ray of steel
he left one's dark and tan
Don't let me love you mama
I'm a truck-driving man.
I love flying down the road
Buddy make this big rig roll
We got miles and miles to go
Before we sleep
From the big sky of Montana
To the peaches in Savannah
We're on our way to play that
Texas swing.
On the highway, looking for the sun
On the highway, you gotta take it as it comes
On the highway, gypsies on the move
Oh what were they tryin' to prove.
Oh it was strange bein' out on the road
And don't it feel good to be comin' home.
Car wheels on a gravel road
Low hum of voices in the front seat
Stories nobody knows
Got folks in Jackson we're going to meet
Car wheels on a gravel road
Cotton fields stretching miles and miles
Hank's voice on the radio
Telephone poles trees and wires fly on by
Car wheels on a gravel road.
I'm going back to the Crescent City
Where everything's still the same
This town has said what it has to say
Now I'm after that back highway
And the longest bridge I've ever crossed over Pontchartrain
Tu le ton temps that's what we say.
We used to drive
Thru Lafayette and Baton Rouge
In a yellow Camino
Listening to Howlin' Wolf.
He liked to stop in Lake Charles
Cause that's the place that he loved
Did you run about as far as you could go
Down the Louisiana highway
Across Lake Ponchatrain.
Feedback, out on Highway 101.
Cruisin' easy,
And your favorite DJ
Havin' fun.
Look out, stand back,
There's a fool out on the road.
Look out, stand back,
There's a fool out on the road.
Had one too many drinks
And he just may overload.
Get off the road
Seems like a good time
Heading back home
Try to see some friends of mine.
Driftin' along
Got my world on a set of wheels
You just got to do it
You know how it really feels
Oh, yeah, we was rollin' 'cross the country.
I traveled 40 miles of bad road
Runnin' from the county man
Just broke from the Stone County prison
And I'm never going back again.
The muses dance and sing
They make the children really ring
I spend the day your way
Call it morning driving thru the sound and
In and out the valley.
