Back

The Ride Tab

by David Alan Coe


THE RIDE
by David Allan Coe

Capo 1

Intro:        X 2

                                  
Well I was thumbing from Montgomery.  Had my guitar on my back.
                                          
  When a stranger stopped beside me in an antique Cadillac.
                              
He was dressed like 1950 half-drunk and hollow-eyed
                                                                    
He said "It's a long walk to Nashville would you like a ride, son."
                                
I sat down in the front seat. He turned on the radio and them
                                             
sad old songs comin' out of them speakers was solid country gold.
                                                        
Then I noticed the stranger was ghost white pale when he asked me for a light
                                                
And I knew there was somthin' strange about this ride.

                                                              
He said "Drifter can you make folks cry when you play and sing?
                                
Have you paid your dues? Can you moan the blues?
        
Can you bend them guitar strings?"
                                                           
He said "Boy can you make folks feel what you feel inside?
                                                                       
'Cause if you're big star bound let me warn ya' it's a long, hard ride."


                                            
Then he cried just south of Nashville and he turned that car around.
                                         
He said "This is where you get off boy 'cause I'm goin' back to Alabam
                                    
As I stepped out of that old Cadillac I said "Mister, many thanks."

He said "You don't have to call me Mister, Mister.

The whole world called me Hank."

                                                              
He said "Drifter can you make folks cry when you play and sing?
                                
Have you paid your dues? Can you moan the blues?
        
Can you bend them guitar strings?"
                                                           
He said "Boy can you make folks feel what you feel inside?
                                                                     
'Cause if you're big star bound let me warn ya' it's a long, hard ride."

                                                              
He said "Drifter can you make folks cry when you play and sing?
                                
Have you paid your dues? Can you moan the blues?
        
Can you bend them guitar strings?"
                                                           
He said "Boy can you make folks feel what you feel inside?
                                                                     
'Cause if you're big star bound let me warn ya' it's a long, hard ride."
                                                                     
'Cause if you're big star bound let me warn ya' it's a long, hard ride."

           repeat and fade