Copper Kettle lyrics
Jim McCannGet you a copper kettle
Get you a copper coil
Cover with new made corn mash
And never more you'll toil
You just lay there by the juniper
While the moon is bright
Watch them jugs a-fillin
In the pale moonlight
My grand-daddy made whiskey
My daddy made did too
We ain't paid no whiskey tax
Since Seventeen Ninety Two
We just lay there by the juniper
While the moon is bright
Watch them jugs a-fillin
In the pale moonlight
Build you your fire of hickory
Hickory and ash and oak
And don't use no green or rotten wood
Because they'll get you by the smoke
As you lay there by the juniper
While the moon is bright
Watch them jugs a-fillin
In the pale moonlight
[Instrumental]
You just lay there by the juniper
While the moon is bright
Watch them jugs a-fillin
In the pale moonlight
Get you a copper kettle
Get you a copper coil
Cover with new made corn mash
And never more you'll toil
You just lay there by the juniper
While the moon is bright
Watch them jugs a-fillin
In the pale moonlight...x2
Song Details
Writer: Albert Frank Beddoe - 1953 as part of the folk opera Go Lightly, Stranger.
Although the song is not of Irish origins, songs about Moonshining have certainly been performed by many an Irish Folk singer. This version by Jim McCann pays testament to that.
The song was first recorded by Joan Baez in 1962 followed by a number of popular folk and country artists including, Bob Dylan, The Two Tones ft. Gordon Lightfoot, Country Gentlemen, Chet Atkins, Old Blind Dogs, and several others.
Brief: The narrator talks about the good aspects of making moonshine... his daddy made it and his grandfather too. The following excerpt from Wikipedia explains the whiskey tax:
The line "We ain't paid no whiskey tax since 1792" alludes to an unpopular tax imposed in 1791 by the fledgling U.S. Federal Government. The levy provoked the Whiskey Rebellion and generally had a short life, barely lasting until 1803.
Genre: Folk Song
Featured Artist: Jim MCCann (pictured)
Album: By Request (2000).
