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Johnny
Bruce Springsteen with the Sessions Band
Popularity ยท Moderate
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๐ฌ๐ง English ยท Original
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Well, they closed down the auto plant in Mahwah late that month
Ralph went out looking for a job but he couldn't find none
He came home too drunk from mixing Tanqueray and wine
Got a gun, shot a night clerk, now they call him Johnny 99
Down in the part of town where when you hit a red light you don't stop
Johnny's waving his gun around, threatening to blow his top
When an off-duty cop snuck up on him from behind
Out in front of the Club Tip Top they slapped the cuffs on Johnny 99
The city supplied a public defender but the judge was Mean John Brown
Came into the courtroom, stared young Johnny down
"The evidence clear, gonna let the sentence, son, fit the crime
Prison for 98 and a year, we'll call it even, Johnny 99"
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Well, a fistfight broke out in the courtroom, they had to drag Johnny's girl away
His mama stood up and shouted, "Judge, don't take my boy this way"
"Son you got any statement you'd like to make
Before the bailiff comes to forever take you away?"
"Now judge, judge, I had debts no honest man could pay
The bank was holding my mortgage, they taking my house away
Well, now I ain't saying that makes me an innocent man
It was more and all this, judge, that put that gun in my hand"
"Well, your honor I do believe I'd be better off dead
If you can take a man's life for the thoughts that's in his head
Then sit back in that chair and think it over, Judge, one more time
Let 'em shave off my hair and put me on them killing line"
Yep
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Sit, sit
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Yes, indeed
The mighty Sessions horn section right there
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