I really an't believe this song has been out 20 years & you don't REALLY get it! As someone mentioned that grandad & dad get killed? There is absolutely no mention of Granddad getting killed. The only ones who die is the revenue man & dad. Also, its a big BLOCK dodge, not black. The police dept's used to donate their old police cars to different organizations for charity auctions, hence he bought the car at a masons lodge auction. A police car would have been what shiners wanted because of the high performance engine block, crank, & heads. Cops had the fastest cars back then so they took those engines & souped them up & lightened the cars so they could outrun cops. That rumblin sound would be from a different canshaft & timing combo, plus HP exhaust. The smell of the whiskey burnin' down copperhead road can be interpreted 2 ways. He did wreck, but you can say he just wrecked or cops wrecked him, it doesn't matter. But the smell is the smell of the weekly load that was in the trunk when the car wrecked. His life was going nowhere so he enlisted cause he would get drafted anyway. He came home with a brand new plan is teh viet cong got GI's addicted to drugs. He saw what people addicted to drugs would do for it. He comes home & continues the tradition of giving the people what they want, MJ is the new shine. He learned from charlie how to boobytrap a place & hide the drugs. That's it!
I am from Johnson County, TN & the only town in the county is Mountain City. Copperhead Rd. is in a little community 5 or 6 miles outside of Mtn City called Neva, sometimes referred to as Crackers Neck.
Steve once told me that Copperhead Rd is really a ficticious state of mind, it can be wherever you want it to be, but there is a copperhead rd in Johnson Co. TN & Steve was aware of this which made it even better. Johnson Co. Tn is in the NE corner of the state bordering NC & VA. It is the TRI-CITY area. Bristol, Kingsport, Johnson City. Bristol is about 2 hrs from Knoxville. I have met Steve Earle on a few occasions. The tri cities is a very musically oriented place. Bristol is the birthplace of country music, & Johnson City has the Blue Plum festival & Little Chicago blues festival. I now reside in Johnson City, which is in Washington Co., Not Johnson. But all of upper E.TN is basically considered the Tri-City area with little communities in between.
@littlechicago1 if he wrecked on his way to Knoxville, then why would the whiskey burning be smelled on Copperhead Road? Is it a really long country Road so maybe they were waiting for him? I always pictured him wrecking somewhere on the way to Knoxville, but then that doesn't make sense unless they burned the still.
@littlechicago1 if he wrecked on his way to Knoxville, then why would the whiskey burning be smelled on Copperhead Road? Is it a really long country Road so maybe they were waiting for him? I always pictured him wrecking somewhere on the way to Knoxville, but then that doesn't make sense unless they burned the still.
I really an't believe this song has been out 20 years & you don't REALLY get it! As someone mentioned that grandad & dad get killed? There is absolutely no mention of Granddad getting killed. The only ones who die is the revenue man & dad. Also, its a big BLOCK dodge, not black. The police dept's used to donate their old police cars to different organizations for charity auctions, hence he bought the car at a masons lodge auction. A police car would have been what shiners wanted because of the high performance engine block, crank, & heads. Cops had the fastest cars back then so they took those engines & souped them up & lightened the cars so they could outrun cops. That rumblin sound would be from a different canshaft & timing combo, plus HP exhaust. The smell of the whiskey burnin' down copperhead road can be interpreted 2 ways. He did wreck, but you can say he just wrecked or cops wrecked him, it doesn't matter. But the smell is the smell of the weekly load that was in the trunk when the car wrecked. His life was going nowhere so he enlisted cause he would get drafted anyway. He came home with a brand new plan is teh viet cong got GI's addicted to drugs. He saw what people addicted to drugs would do for it. He comes home & continues the tradition of giving the people what they want, MJ is the new shine. He learned from charlie how to boobytrap a place & hide the drugs. That's it! I am from Johnson County, TN & the only town in the county is Mountain City. Copperhead Rd. is in a little community 5 or 6 miles outside of Mtn City called Neva, sometimes referred to as Crackers Neck. Steve once told me that Copperhead Rd is really a ficticious state of mind, it can be wherever you want it to be, but there is a copperhead rd in Johnson Co. TN & Steve was aware of this which made it even better. Johnson Co. Tn is in the NE corner of the state bordering NC & VA. It is the TRI-CITY area. Bristol, Kingsport, Johnson City. Bristol is about 2 hrs from Knoxville. I have met Steve Earle on a few occasions. The tri cities is a very musically oriented place. Bristol is the birthplace of country music, & Johnson City has the Blue Plum festival & Little Chicago blues festival. I now reside in Johnson City, which is in Washington Co., Not Johnson. But all of upper E.TN is basically considered the Tri-City area with little communities in between.
@littlechicago1 if he wrecked on his way to Knoxville, then why would the whiskey burning be smelled on Copperhead Road? Is it a really long country Road so maybe they were waiting for him? I always pictured him wrecking somewhere on the way to Knoxville, but then that doesn't make sense unless they burned the still.
@littlechicago1 if he wrecked on his way to Knoxville, then why would the whiskey burning be smelled on Copperhead Road? Is it a really long country Road so maybe they were waiting for him? I always pictured him wrecking somewhere on the way to Knoxville, but then that doesn't make sense unless they burned the still.