I came to tell my story to all these young and eager minds
To look in their unspoiled faces and their curious bright eyes
Stories of corruption, crime and killing, yes it's true
Greed and fixed elections, guns and drugs and whores and booze

It's been a while since I put on a suit of my own clothes
And even longer since I cast my shadow on a church house door
They say every sin is deadly but I believe they may be wrong
I'm guilty of all seven and I don't feel too bad at all

I used to have a wad of hundred dollar bills in the back pocket of my suit
I had a .45 underneath my coat and another one in my boot
I drove a big ole Cadillac, bought a new one anytime I pleased
And I put more lawmen in the ground than Alabama put cottonseed

I spent a few years on vacation, sanctioned by the state I mentioned
But a man like me don't do no time too hard to come back from
The meanest of the mean, I see you lock away and toss the key
But they're all just loud mouth punks to me, I've scraped meaner off my shoe

Somewhere, I ain't saying, there's a hole that holds a judge
The last one that I dug myself
And I must admit I was sad to lay him in it, but I did the best I could
Once his Honor grows a conscience, well folks, that there just ain't no good

There's a pretty girl out there said "Daddy, you stay cool tonight
All I need from you is to come home and be here by my side
Say what you gotta say to shut their Bibles and their mouths
If they was to tie a noose, they'd have to lay their Bibles down"

I ain't here to save no souls and even if I could
I could never save enough to put back half the ones I took
So if they rest in torment you can't say it's cause of me
They'd long been bought and paid for like that fool's in Tennessee


Lyrics submitted by TonyRo2

Cottonseed Lyrics as written by John Michael Cooley

Lyrics © Hipgnosis Songs Group

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Cottonseed song meanings
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3 Comments

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  • 0
    General Comment

    Sounds like a sociopath serving life for God knows what. Maybe he's still on the outside...the pretty girl by his side. I can't tell.

    bkabbotton May 10, 2011   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    I posted a dumb comment. Really self explanatory. Songmeanings doesn't allow deletion.

    bkabbotton April 13, 2014   Link
  • 0
    General Comment

    When I first heard this song a friend of mine showed me it. He told me that it is in reference to the original Walking tall movie but from the criminals point of view. I have never been able to find anything to back that up. I will say I have done some research on "Horrific crimes in Alabama" and the main thing that keeps popping up is about a guy by the name of Derrick Dearman who gruesomely murdered 5 people one of which was a female who was pregnant. But being that the song talks about killing police officers, judges and people from the community I'm not sure on what this song could be in reference too.

    gilmourfanon December 22, 2016   Link

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