"Copperhead Road" is a song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter

Steve Earle Stephen Fain Earle (; born January 17, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, author, and actor. Earle began his career as a songwriter in Nashville and released his first EP in 1982. Initially working in the country music g ...

. It was released in 1988 as the first single and title track from his third studio album of the same name. The song reached number 10 on the U.S. ''Billboard'' Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, and was Earle's highest-peaking song to date on that chart in the United States. The song has sold 1.1 million digital copies in the United States as of September 2017. On April 20, 2023, the

Tennessee General Assembly The Tennessee General Assembly (TNGA) is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is a part-time bicameral legislature consisting of a Senate and a House of Representatives. The Speaker of the Senate carries the additional title ...

passed an act recognizing the song as the 11th official state song of the state of

Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

Content

The song's narrator is named John Lee Pettimore III, whose father and grandfather were both active in

moonshine Moonshine is high-proof liquor that is usually produced illegally. The name was derived from a tradition of creating the alcohol during the nighttime, thereby avoiding detection. In the first decades of the 21st century, commercial dist ...

making and bootlegging in rural

Johnson County, Tennessee Johnson County is a county located in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2010 census, the population was 18,244. Its county seat is Mountain City. It is the state's northeasternmost county, sharing borders with Virginia and North Carolina. ...

. Pettimore's grandfather visited town only rarely, in order to buy supplies for a

still A still is an apparatus used to distill liquid mixtures by heating to selectively boil and then cooling to condense the vapor. A still uses the same concepts as a basic distillation apparatus, but on a much larger scale. Stills have been used ...

he had set up in a holler along Copperhead Road. Pettimore's father hauled the moonshine to

Knoxville Knoxville is a city in and the county seat of Knox County in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 United States census, Knoxville's population was 190,740, making it the largest city in the East Tennessee Grand Division and the state's ...

each week in an old police cruiser he bought at a surplus auction. According to a family story, a revenue man once confronted John Sr. on Copperhead Road, intent on apprehending him for his moonshine activities, but never returned. John Jr. himself is killed in a fiery car crash on the same road while driving to Knoxville with a weekly shipment. Pettimore enlists in the

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

on his birthday, believing he will soon be drafted, and serves two

tours of duty For military personnel, a tour of duty is usually a period of time spent in combat or in a hostile environment. In an army, for instance, soldiers on active duty serve 24 hours a day, seven days a week for the length of their service commitment. ...

in Vietnam. Once he returns home, he decides to use the Copperhead Road land to grow

marijuana Cannabis, also known as marijuana among other names, is a psychoactive drug from the cannabis plant. Native to Central or South Asia, the cannabis plant has been used as a drug for both recreational and entheogenic purposes and in various tra ...

, using seeds from Colombia and Mexico. He resolves not to be caught by the

DEA The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA; ) is a United States federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Justice tasked with combating drug trafficking and distribution within the U.S. It is the lead agency for domestic en ...

using techniques learnt from the

Viet Cong , , war = the Vietnam War , image = FNL Flag.svg , caption = The flag of the Viet Cong, adopted in 1960, is a variation on the flag of North Vietnam. Sometimes the lower stripe was green. , active ...

Influence and legacy

Copperhead Road was an actual road near

Mountain City, Tennessee Mountain City is a town in and the county seat of Johnson County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 2,383 at the 2000 census and 2,531 at the 2010 census. It is the northeasternmost county seat in Tennessee. In addition, at an elevatio ...

, in an area known to locals as "Big Dry Run" although it has since been renamed Copperhead Hollow Road, owing to theft of road signs bearing the song's name. The song inspired a popular

line dance A line dance is a choreographed dance in which a group of people dance along to a repeating sequence of steps while arranged in one or more lines or rows. These lines usually face all in the same direction, or less commonly face each other.Knight, ...

, and has been used as the theme music for the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...

reality series '' Moonshiners''. The song's blend of country and Southern rock has influenced several artists, including

Eric Church Kenneth Eric Church (born May 3, 1977) is an American country music singer-songwriter. He has released nine studio albums through Capitol Nashville since 2005. His debut album, 2006's '' Sinners Like Me'', produced three singles on the ''Billboar ...

Travis Tritt James Travis Tritt (born February 9, 1963) is an American country music singer and songwriter. He signed to Warner Bros. Records in 1989, releasing seven studio albums and a greatest hits package for the label between then and 1999. In the 20 ...

Brothers Osborne Brothers Osborne is an American country music duo consisting of brothers T.J. Osborne (lead vocals, rhythm guitar) and John Osborne (lead guitar, background vocals). Born in Deale, Maryland, the duo signed a recording contract with EMI Records ...

Chris Stapleton Christopher Alvin Stapleton (born April 15, 1978) is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. He was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and grew up in Staffordsville, Kentucky. In 2001, Stapleton moved to Nashville, Tennessee, to ...

and

Jason Aldean Jason Aldean (born Jason Aldine Williams; February 28, 1977) is an American country music singer. Since 2005, he has been signed to BBR Music Group, Broken Bow Records, a record label for which he has released ten albums and 40 singles. His 2010 ...

Music video

The music video was directed by Tony Vanden Ende and premiered in early 1988.

Chart performance

Other versions

In 2018 American metal band

DevilDriver DevilDriver is an American heavy metal band from Santa Barbara, California, formed in 2002, consisting of vocalist Dez Fafara, lead guitarist Mike Spreitzer, drummer Davier Pérez, bassist Jon Miller and rhythm guitarist Alex Lee. The band was ...

recorded a version of this song on their album "Outlaws 'til the End Vol. 1".

References

1988 singles Steve Earle songs Songs written by Steve Earle Song recordings produced by Tony Brown (record producer) Songs about alcohol Songs about roads Songs about drugs MCA Records singles 1988 songs {{1988-country-song-stub