Top 10 Country Songs About Driving an 18 Wheeler

There may be country songs about farmers and coal miners, but the heart of occupation based country music is the trucker song. Songs about 18 wheelers rose to prominence in the 1960s, then exploded in popularity in the 1970s as CB radio briefly took over popular culture. These songs run the gamut of truck related emotion, from the highs of outrunning the police to the lows of a solitary life on the road. On your next road trip, put these 10 trucking hits on your playlist while you lay the hammer down and watch for smokies on your backdoor.

10 - Giddyup Go
by Red Sovine

The life of a trucker isn’t all fun stuff like blowing the doors off of smokies and picking up seat covers, and Red Sovine proves it. His songs are often mournful monologues about a lonely life on the road, and other ludicrously sad topics (such as a child starving to death on a mall Santa’s lap on Christmas Eve). Giddyup Go’s central tragedy is pretty tame by Sovine standards (his family disappears without much fanfare), but Red’s truckstop reunion with his estranged son will leave a lump in the throat of even the toughest gear jammer.

9 - Six Days On The Road
by Dave Dudley
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Six Days On The Road is ballad of a horny drugged up trucker who has not had sex with his wife in nearly a week and is ready to burst. (Although, he makes it clear that he could have cheated on her if he wanted to, he just didn’t want to.) Each verse ups the ante and gives deeper context to Dudley’s determination, and each chorus drives home the point that six days is a long time to spend on the road. By the end, his hometown is finally in sight and you really feel for the guy! 

8 - 18 Wheels Rollin
by Betty Amos
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The second the banjo starts picking in 18 Wheels Rollin, you know you’re in good hands. This song is a great companion piece to Six Days On The Road, it’s about a horny truck stop waitress waiting for her truck driving man to come home. (She also points out that she could have cheated if she wanted to). This fast moving bluegrass number sets the perfect mood for any high speed truck chase.

7 - Hello, I’m A Truck
by Red Simpson
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Red Simpson finally gives voice to the heroes who can’t speak for themselves, the trucks! Told from the POV of a disgruntled 18 wheeler, this song makes a simple and irrefutable point: “There’d be no truck drivers if it wasn’t for us trucks.” From Simpson’s confident opening declaration that he is in fact a truck, to the closing truck noises he makes with his mouth, Hello, I’m A Truck is a classic truck jam told from a fresh perspective. True to trucker song form, the lonesome titular truck gets horny for a pink Mack rig on the other side of the parking lot.

6 - Girl On The Billboard
by Del Reeves
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Of all the sexually deprived people (and trucks) on this list, Del Reeves has let loneliness get to his head the most. Girl On The Billboard chronicles Reeves’ deepening obsession with a towel-clad woman that he sees painted on a billboard until his fixation reaches a fever pitch one night and he breaks into the artists home at 4:45am. Thinking fast to save the model’s identity from this crazed trucker, the painter claims she isn’t real and forcibly ejects Del from his home. Despite the truly unhinged narrative, Girl On The Billboard is a fun little ditty that’s easy to sing along with.

5 - Give Me 40 Acres
by Willis Brothers
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While most trucker songs spin yarns about the feats of master drivers, “Give Me 40 Acres” recounts a rookie’s calamitous first trip to Boston. Our unlucky gear jammer gets stuck in the wrong direction at every possible opportunity, then exclaims (often while openly weeping) that he needs 40 acres to turn this rig around. The upbeat rhythm, comical exaggerations and classy self censorship of the word “hell”, make “Give Me 40 Acres” a toe tapping trucking hit for the whole family.

4 - Bud The Spud
by Stompin’ Tom Connors

Contrary to what I had believed my entire life, Bud The Spud is NOT actually a song about an anthropomorphic potato who gives truck rides to other potatoes. Bud is in fact a human man nicknamed “The Spud”, because he hauls big loads of potatoes from PEI to Toronto. There’s no real conflict in this song, the man loves potatoes, and sometimes that’s all you need. “Another big load of potatoes!” is one of Stompin’ Tom’s funnest lyrics to quote, and that alone solidifies Bud The Spud’s place on this list.

3 - Eastbound and Down
by Jerry Reed
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Any truck song list would be incomplete without the theme song from arguably the most iconic truck movie of all time, Smokey And The Bandit. Eastbound And Down distills the thrill of trucking down to its essence: “We’ve got a long way to go, and a short time to get there.” The driving rhythm and exciting lyrics give this song a sense of real urgency. Not a lot of frills in this one, just the driving need to get from point A to B and a truly awesome guitar solo in the middle. You’ll want to roll down the windows for this one!

2 - Convoy
by CW McCall
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“Eastbound and Down” may be the theme song to a popular movie, but “Convoy” was such a popular song they made a movie based on it! While the lyrics to this song are impossible to decipher without having a tab open on the Wikipedia entry for CB slang, I think the gist of it is as follows: A man named Rubber Duck gets bunch of angry truckers together in a convoy and then leads an assault on the police and the army. Trucker country, outlaw country and disco strings all come together to elevate this beautifully absurd song into a full on 1970s anthem.

1 - Teddy Bear
by Red Sovine

It was impossible to limit this list to only one Red Sovine song. Frankly, he’s The Beatles of trucking music, and Teddy Bear is his I Wanna Hold Your Hand. Teddy Bear is the story of a trucker who forms a friendship with a disabled little boy he meets on CB radio. It seems like a simple premise, but Sovine’s earnest delivery of lyrics like “This hot load of freight is gonna have to wait” and “I’m not much help with my two crippled feet”, make this tragic tale a sublime masterpiece. Whether it’s laughter or tears, the climax of this song when Red finally gives Teddy Bear a ride will definitely make you feel something.