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Working On The Highway Lyrics

Friday night's pay night guys fresh out of work
Talking about the weekend scrubbing off the dirt
Some heading home to their families some looking to get hurt
Some going down to Stovell wearing trouble on their shirts

I work for the county out on 95
All day I hold a red flag and watch the traffic pass me by
In my head I keep a picture of a pretty little miss
Someday mister I'm gonna lead a better life than this

Working on the highway laying down the blacktop
Working on the highway all day long I don't stop
Working on the highway blasting through the bedrock
Working on the highway, working on the highway

I met her at a dance down at the union hall
She was standing with her brothers back up against the wall
Sometimes we'd go walking down the union tracks
One day I looked straight at her and she looked straight back

Working on the highway...

I saved up my money and I put it all away
I went to see her daddy but we didn't have much to say
"Son can't you see that she's just a little girl
She don't know nothing about this cruel cruel world"

We lit out down to Florida we got along all right
One day her brothers came and got her and they took me in a black and white
The prosecutor kept the promise that he made on that day
And the judge got mad and he put me straight away
I wake up every morning to the work bell clang
Me and the warden go swinging on the Charlotte County road gang

Working on the highway...
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Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

This is officially the happiest, most upbeat song about statutory rape ever.

Amen...only Bruce can take the worst moments of American existence and make them musical gems. The upbeat pop-influenced melodies overlaying the downtrodden lyrics are one of his hallmarks, especially on the Born in the USA album, which seems to me a brilliant critique on the American society in the 1980s.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

it's about a guy who falls in love with a girl and is put into jail and now he workds on a chain gang making highways

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

The ultimate working man song from the Boss. Here is a guy who works his ass off all day on the highway. He (like most of us) is dreaming about a better life, meeting the right girl and settling down. And then when he finally meets the right girl, her father does not approve (methinks she may not be of the age of consent, maybe 17?) So they take off for Florida for a new life together, but they get found and he gets put away. And then in the ironic ending, he finds himself back working on the highway, but on a chain gang. Great fun song!

I don't think he's BACK to working on the highway. At the beginning of the song, he is on the chain gang, and the song is him explaining how he wound up out here.

@rmcd0494 No. He IS back working on the highway. In the beginning of the song, he says he works for the county out on 95, meaning I-95, obviously. At the end, he works in Charlotte County, which is a western Florida county through which I-95 doesn't run. Plus, it makes for a more coincindal twist to the song this way.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

What is Stovell?

@redly40 there are a few places in the USA called Stovall .... wonder if that is what he meant?? As it seems they are referencing a place.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

lol Can't believe this song was missed.

I like it. Obviously about a young guy that works hard to make a living and recently found love.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

The unleased enbraska version is waaaay better.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

unreleased Nebraska

ya know what I mean

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

this song rocks.

Cover art for Working On The Highway lyrics by Bruce Springsteen

Can't sit still during this one!

 
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