Ricky Fitzpatrick: Music
Highway 98
Highway 98 is THE road, running out of downtown Commerce, GA and into and through Madison County, GA…Danielsville, Ila, Comer. It’s a geographical point of reference and practically a landmark, in and of itself. As I’ve heard it said, “Nothing happens in Madison County that it don’t roll down 98 first.” And I would agree.
It’s a long, straight, lonely road. Houses and barns and pastures on either side, all the way down. A few stores. But mostly just big hills and long, straight stretches of blacktop. It’s very picturesque to tell the truth.
So I figured if there can be songs about Highway 40, Highway 101 or Route 66, well, we ought to be able to have a song about Highway 98. It’s just as integral to out lives here as those other roads are, there.
So I wrote it.
And in a narrative style, kind of Shawn Mullins meets Bob Dylan thing, I started penning the words that colored my memories, from the very start. It’s very literal and very autobiographical, but fans say that they identify with it.
I get stories of people who say they could listen to this, close their eyes and it feels just like their right there. The Jehovah’s Witness building, Midway Store, the courthouse in Danielsville, the school.
And it’s personal for me… “my best friend Todd’s old house” and “my grandpa’s”, those places are real.
And when I sing “Highway 98, I swear, there’s something about your lines”, I feel it all the way down to my bones, every time.
Hope you like what you hear. And I hope it makes you itch to take a drive down Highway 98, just to see what you can see.
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FYI, “Highway 98” is part of an ongoing campaign to be named by the GA State House of Representatives as the “Official Song of GA Highway 98”. You can help make that happen by signing our online petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/H982009/petition.html.
Please go there today and add your name and help us make Georgia Music History!
Highway 98
Words & Music by Ricky Fitzpatrick
Verse One
Headed out of Commerce, ‘cross the railroad tracks and the new bypass.
Right about there the world begins to change.
Past the new Jehovah’s Witness building, and my best friend Todd’s old house,
Takin’ me right on back again.
Verse Two
Not too slow…not too fast, set the cruise and let off the gas.
Blacks Creek Church Road and drifting through my dreams.
Past the county line and Midway store, a million other times before.
And in the farms and the barns I’m wrapped up in your wings…
Chorus
Highway 98, I swear, there’s something about your lines,
Makes a good ol’ boy get lost inside your miles.
Highway 98, out there, in the middle of the highway signs,
Makes me want to take my time…on you.
Verse Three
Past my grandpa’s house and Jot ‘Em Down; a thousand years from the nearest town.
There ain’t no one else on the road tonight but me.
‘round Danielsville and the register homes, like the lyrics straight out of some classic Country song
Not a care in the world as far as I can see.
Verse Four
On past the high school and under the stars, occasional headlights from the passing cars,
And the whole world just seems to be right again out here.
Destination: far as I can take it, all the way down 98.
I just might keep on drivin’ all night…but I don’t care.
Chorus
Highway 98, I swear, there’s something about your lines,
Makes a good ol’ boy get lost inside your miles.
Highway 98, out there, in the middle of the highway signs,
Makes me want to take my time…on you.