1
Well my name's John Lee Pettimore
Same as my daddy and his daddy before
You hardly ever saw Grandaddy down here
He only come to town about twice a year
He'd buy a hundred pounds of yeast and some copper line
Everybody knew that he made moonshine
Now the revenue man wanted Grandaddy bad
Headed up the holler with everything he had
'Fore my time but I've been told
He never come back from Copperhead Road
Now Daddy ran whiskey in a big block Dodge
Bought it at an auction at the Mason's Lodge
Johnson County Sheriff painted on the side
Just shot a coat of primer then he looked inside
Well him and my uncle tore that engine down
I still remember that rumblin' sound
When the Sheriff came around in the middle of the night
Heard mama cryin', knew something wasn't right
He was headed down to Knoxville with the weekly load
You could smell the whiskey burnin' down Copperhead Road
I volunteered for the Army on my birthday
They draft the white trash first, 'round here anyway
I done two tours of duty in Vietnam
I came home with a brand new plan
I take the seed from Columbia and Mexico
I just plant it up the holler down Copperhead Road
And now the D.E.A.'s got a chopper in the air
I wake up screaming like I'm back over there
I learned a thing or two from Charlie don't you know
You'd better stay away from Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Same as my daddy and his daddy before
You hardly ever saw Grandaddy down here
He only come to town about twice a year
He'd buy a hundred pounds of yeast and some copper line
Everybody knew that he made moonshine
Now the revenue man wanted Grandaddy bad
Headed up the holler with everything he had
'Fore my time but I've been told
He never come back from Copperhead Road
Now Daddy ran whiskey in a big block Dodge
Bought it at an auction at the Mason's Lodge
Johnson County Sheriff painted on the side
Just shot a coat of primer then he looked inside
Well him and my uncle tore that engine down
I still remember that rumblin' sound
When the Sheriff came around in the middle of the night
Heard mama cryin', knew something wasn't right
He was headed down to Knoxville with the weekly load
You could smell the whiskey burnin' down Copperhead Road
I volunteered for the Army on my birthday
They draft the white trash first, 'round here anyway
I done two tours of duty in Vietnam
I came home with a brand new plan
I take the seed from Columbia and Mexico
I just plant it up the holler down Copperhead Road
And now the D.E.A.'s got a chopper in the air
I wake up screaming like I'm back over there
I learned a thing or two from Charlie don't you know
You'd better stay away from Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Copperhead Road
Lyrics submitted by shauncreaney, edited by MacHudde
Copperhead Road Lyrics as written by Steve Earle
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
A couple more thoughts that haven't been covered: The bagpipes at the opening of the song are reminiscent of the Irish and Scottish heritage of many people in the American South. Bagpipes also invoke the insurrectionist/survivalist spirit of the Irish and Scottish, who have spent centuries fighting a much larger foe (the English). It has been argued that the fiery fighting spirit of the Scottish and Irish immigrants contributed to the Southern states succeeding in the American Civil War. Malcolm Gladwell has an interesting chapter on the South as an honour-based society in his book "Outliers."
Also, Earle writes in an interesting parallel between John Lee and his father, in that his father used a cop car (a tool of the "establishment") to help him run moonshine, while John Lee III uses the military (another tool of the "establishment") to defend his contraband.