There are songs that make you tap your foot… and then there are songs that introduce you to a whole new kind of electricity. “Guitar Man” is one of those rare moments where a personality, a sound, and a story all hit at once — exactly the way Jerry Reed lived.
Jerry didn’t just play the guitar; he attacked it, joked with it, pushed it, and somehow coaxed out a groove that felt half reckless, half genius. That wild, snapping rhythm? It came straight out of the backroads he grew up on — places where music wasn’t polished, it was lived.
What makes the song special isn’t only the musicianship, though that alone could start an argument among pickers. It’s the spirit behind it: the story of a man chasing his dream with nothing but a guitar, a beat-up car, and a stubborn belief that sound and sincerity matter more than fame.
Years later, Elvis himself would hear the record, stop his entire studio session, and demand:
“Find Jerry Reed.”
Because even the King knew — nobody else could deliver that fire.
Listening to “Guitar Man” today feels like grabbing onto the tail end of a live wire. You hear Jerry’s grin, his grit, and that unmistakable swagger. And underneath it all, you hear a man who made his own lane and dared anyone to keep up.
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Lyrics
Well, I quit my job down at the car wash
Left my mama a goodbye note
By sundown I’d left Kingston
With my guitar under my coat
I hitchhiked all the way down to Memphis
Got a room at the YMCA
For the next three weeks, I went huntin’ them nights
Just lookin’ for a place to play
Well, I thought my pickin’ would set ’em on fire
But nobody wanted to hire a guitar man
Well, I nearly ’bout starved to death down in Memphis
I run outta money and luck
So I bought me a ride down to Macon, Georgia
On a overloaded poultry truck
I thumbed on down to Panama City
Started pickin’ out some o’ them all night bars
Hopin’ I could make myself a dollar
Makin’ music on my guitar
I got the same old story at them all night piers
There ain’t no room around here for a guitar man
We don’t need a guitar man, son
So I slept in the hobo jungles
Roamed a thousand miles of track
Till I found myself in Mobile Alabama
At a club they call Big Jack’s
A little four-piece band was jammin’
So I took my guitar and I sat in
I showed ’em what a band would sound like
With a swingin’ little guitar man
Show ’em, son
If you ever take a trip down to the ocean
Find yourself down around Mobile
Oh make it on out to a club called Jack’s
If you got a little time to kill
Just follow that crowd of people
You’ll wind up out on his dance floor
Diggin’ the finest little five piece group
Up and down the Gulf of Mexico
Guess who’s leadin’ that five-piece band
Well, wouldn’t ya know, it’s that swingin’ little guitar man
Yeah yeah, guitar man, hahaha