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,
  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.