Truckin' Top Ten: Brother Trucker (#5)

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Nothing like a rainy day to bring out the sleep monsters. I feel refreshed after my afternoon nap, ready to attack cleaning my office here at home. But first, you need to be tormented with another song about truck drivers. This was inspired by @LoriAMoore and is dedicated to @UncleJoe for all his years of service as a truck driver. Here's the next song on the list...and look, it isn't country! #5: Brother Trucker - James Taylor Sweet baby James wrote a few songs for a play called Working, based on a Studs Terkel book. Two of those songs, "Millworker" (my favorite JT song) and "Brother Trucker," ended up on Taylor's 1979 album Flag. "Brother Trucker" is about the independent truck driver ("I'm an independent man, I don't make no Teamster dough, 'cause the AFL and the CIO still don't own the road, and the only man telling me where to go is the man who owns my load") and his love/hate relationship with his job ("I'm a driving fool, I make my own rules"...."Big state police, well, I'm in a hurry, would you let me go in peace?"). I watch the drivers at truck stops (I'm sorry, "travel plazas"), and I have a friend who reports in on Facebook where he's "down for the night" on his runs. Thank God for the men and women who'll do that job to bring us our goods. Roll, brother trucker, indeed. Brother Trucker Written by James Taylor Recorded by James Taylor From Flag, 1979 Breaker number nine (profanity warning):