Well, that label man said
"Son, now can you sing a little bit more clear?"
Said, "Your voice might be too genuine
Your song's a little too sincere
Can you sing a little more about outlaws and
The way things used to be?"
He told me, "You just worry about writing 'em songs
Leave everything else to me"
Daddy, was a highwayman
But he never wrote any old country song
Papaw never stayed out raising hell
'Til the break of dawn
But he raised a proud coal miners daughter
And I'm proud to be her son
She told me, "Boy, I don't care if you hit it big
'Cause you're already number one"
That's the way it goes in this day and age
Said you ain't gotta read between the lines
And you just don't turn the page
Well, the most outlaw thing that I've ever done
Give a good woman a ring, that's the way it goes
Life ain't fair and the world is mean
♪
Well, I still got the wife and the dog
But I swapped my truck out for a van
Gonna hit the road, find the end of that long
White line in the promised land
You won't hear my song on the radio
New sounds all the rage
You can always find me in a smokey bar
With bad sound and a dim lit stage
That's the way it goes in this day and age
Said you ain't gotta read between the lines
And you just don't turn the page
Well, the most outlaw thing that I've ever done
Give a good woman a ring, that's the way it goes
Life ain't fair and the world is mean
That's the way it goes
Life ain't fair and the world is mean