30,000 Pounds of Bananas - Harry Chapin
The song is played with a capo that throughout the song climbs the frets. For
proof, watch him live on YouTube.
All chords used are to current Capo setting:
: 022100 : xx0232 : x24442
*: 022300 : x4x232 : 355433
: 022030 : 002220 : 224432
: 002210 *: 577655
CAPO 1st FRET
INTRO: * * (x2)
It was just after dark when the truck started down
The hill that leads into Scranton Pennsylvania.
Carrying thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
Carrying thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
LINK: * *
He was a young driver,
*
just out on his second job.
And he was carrying the next day's pasty fruits
For everyone in that coal-scarred city,
Where children play without despair
*
In backyard slag piles, and folks manage to eat each day
About thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
Yes, just about thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
TEMPO INCREASE
LINK: * *
He passed a sign that he should have seen,
saying, "Shift to low gear or fifty dollar fine, my friend."
He was thinking perhaps about the warm-breathed woman
Who was waiting at the journey's end.
He started down the two-mile drop,
The curving road that wound from the top of the hill.
He was pushing on through the shortening miles that ran down to the depot.
Just a few more miles to go,
Then he'd go home and have her ease his long, cramped day away.
And the smell of thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
D D/C# Bm (Slide CAPO 2nd FRET)
Yes, the smell of thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
TEMPO INCREASE
He was picking speed as the city spread its twinkling lights below him.
But he paid no heed as the shivering thoughts of the night's
Delights went through him.
(strum) (strum)
His foot nursed the brakes to slow him down,
(strum) (strum)
But the pedal floored easy without a sound.
He said, "Christ!"
It was funny how he had named the only man who could save him now.
He was trapped inside a dead-end hellslide,
Riding on his fear-hunched back
*
With every one of those yellow-green,
I'm telling you, thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
D D/C# Bm (Slide CAPO 3rd FRET)
Yes, there were thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
DOUBLE TIME!
He barely made the sweeping curve that led into the steepest grade.
And he missed the thankful passing bus at ninety miles an hour.
And he said, "God, make it a dream!"
As he rode his last ride down.
And he said, "God, make it a dream!"
As he rode his last ride down.
And he sideswiped nineteen neat parked cars,
Clipped off thirteen telephone poles,
Hit two houses, bruised eight trees,
And Blue-Crossed seven people.
It was then he lost his head,
Not to mention an arm or two before he stopped.
N..
And he smeared for four hundred yards
Along the hill that leads into Scranton, Pennsylvania.
All those thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
ORIGINAL TEMPO
(Fade in) E
You see the man who told me about it on the bus,
As it went up the hill out of Scranton, Pennsylvania.
He shrugged his shoulders, he shook his head,
N..
And he said (and this is exactly what he said),
"Boy, that sure must've been something.
Just imagine thirty thousand pounds of bananas.
N..
Yes, there were thirty thousand pounds of mashed bananas.
Of bananas. (Repeat with Barred F, then F#, etc. until fade out.)