Never rode me a Horse in The Appalachian Hills

Never rode me a horse in the Appalachian Hills, never roped me cattle
Never sat with Johnny Cash at Folsom prison, never loved me June
But I listened to the radio, heard me some Hank and the honky tonk
Sang along to “Hey Good Lookin’,” “He Stopped Loving Her Today”

Had me the blues, but I never bothered to sing, instead I cried and cried
Sat on my bed and told myself lies, like Howling Wolf with a guitar
Born so blue couldn’t tell the difference between rain water and tears
Walked the earth alone for years and years, never a care for the world

Never loved me a Big Mama Thorton, she came to me in an Italian girl
What I would have loved in an Odetta, came in a whore from Kentucky
These were the lies I told, that love was a country girl, some Loretta Lyn
Drinking with me at a bar, looking her over, crying onto my shoulder

Country came to the Big Apple, cow girls by their lonesome in subway cars
People watching them over with spite, Dottie Wests in pretty flower dresses
Cowboy boots and lipstick, jonesing the George Joneses in cowboy hats
Doing a two-step at Denim and Diamonds, drinking up on Budweiser beer

It was the year when white guys sat in watering holes, drinking dollar drafts
Listening to Merle Haggard, talking about things that made them itch
A woman that had come and gone, so beautifully turned into a country song
So I sat there, white folk all around me, never a cuss or a fight to be had

They called me the African Cow Heck, sure loved me some rock and roll
White ass music played by city slickers, music we used to call our very own
Given a twitch, some back beat bitchin’ blues, sung by long haired men
In their dirty jeans they stood like trees, I scratched from Cobain’s disease

On some street corners the black boys were beating drums, stick to finger
Beat that box all day long; it was the blues they were crying, dying inside
From baby mama trouble, looking to make money, begging for some love
Somehow they all disappeared, like they had been put to sleep by death

But they were birthed many a moon ago in neighborhoods like the Bronx
Where gang members took to the dirty streets with their break dancing
Hip hop was born; I grew to love Sugar Hill Gang’s Rapper’s Delight
UTFO and Houdini, female rappers like Roxanne Shante and MC Lyte

But Country came to the Big Apple, that year when cowgirls were singing
From “Ways to be Wicked” to “Passionate Kisses,” I bought my records
At Bleecker Bob's Records; paid cash for albums like Pontiac, Guitar Town
Sang along to “Guitars and Cadillacs” “She’s no lady, She’s my wife,”

It was the year when white guys sat in watering holes drinking dollar drafts
Listening to Merle Haggard, talking about things that made them itch
A woman that had come and gone, so beautifully turned into a country song
So I sat there, white folk all around me, never a cuss or a fight to be had

They called me the African Cow Heck, sure loved me some rock and roll
White ass music played by city slickers, music we used to call our very own
Given a twitch, some back beat bitchin’ blues, sung by long haired men
In their dirty jeans they stood like trees, I scratched from Cobain’s disease