HillBilly Highway - Words by Fred Brown, music by KD Milner; arrangement by KD Milner
KDMilner- vocals, banjo, guitar, harmony vocals, R. Puckett- Bass, J. Wells- Fiddle, R. Whitaker- Pedal Steel
Fred was a dear friend who would give me song lyrics and poems that he had wrote to see if I could do anything with them like a melody for a song. We did a quick recording of it long ago for a compilation record called Sorrow's End, a record Fred had made with the help of Jesse Wells and CLack MT String Band and friends- documenting "sounds of the times" during the history of our local Rowan County Feud, a bloody war of families. I have been playing this song in my sets with my HillFolk band since then and it holds a special truth for me because I know all too well about that HillBilly Highway, that space between the north and your kin and homeland. Lonely but necessary road, definately aglow when heading back south.
Lyrics
HillBilly Highway
written by Fred Brown
music by KarlyDawn Milner
On the HillBilly Highway, Coal Grove to Detroit
My Very First Memory, a '58 Ford
I Stand on the backseat, waving goodbye Kentucky
Those Lost Lonesome Hills, Where My Daddy calls home
My Momma's eyes red in the cracked rearview mirror
Hank & Loretta sang 'ore the radio
My Daddy's jaw set, starin holes through the windshield
one hundred miles gone and 400 to go
<>Every night we'd lay down in green pastures
The Lord was our Shepard , he kept us from harm
Momma would sing to us songs of the Mountains
While Daddy dreamed hard of a house and a farm
Come Friday evenin, we'd head out for Kentucky
Momma &Pappaw would welcome us there
Prodigal children return from the northland
to drink the fresh water and breathe the mountain air
On the HillBilly Highway, Detroit to Coal Grove
We'd take our shoes off, we'd put our shoes on
But always our hearts held the hope of something better
high hills and hollers that we would call home
<><>Every night we'd lay down in green pastures
The Lord was our shepard , he kept us from harm
Momma would sing to us songs of the Mountains
While Daddy dreamed hard of a house and a farm