Released: October 22, 1976
Songwriter: Bernie Taupin Elton John
Producer: Gus Dudgeon
[Verse 1]
Now, it was just like Frankie and Johnny
And it was just like Stagger Lee
Dolly Summers was a simple girl
From a mid-west family
With a stucco home and her own Mustang
And a charge account at sears
She had everything that a girl could want
To live happy for the rest of her years
But the thing that she wanted most of all
Was the thing that she had lost
To the arms of a downtown black jack hustler
By the name of Candy floss
They'd slipped town on a late night train
Heading for the west
Dolly slipped behind the wheel of her mustang
With a piece between her breast
[Chorus]
She put a pistol in her shoulder holster
She took her car up from Santa Fe
Yesterday morning she was washing dishes
Now she's hunting down a runaway
Don't judge a man by a misdemeanor
You may be sorry when his light goes out
Don't put that pistol in your shoulder holster
You can never, never tell if the Law's about
[Verse 5]
If it seemed just like a movie
Or a night of bad TV
They should have had a picture of Dolly's face
As she drove across the country
With daggers drawn for her fallen man
An venom in her heart
It was nearly dawn when she caught them up
Making out in a picnic park
But the thing that shook her rigid
As she fumbled for her gun
Was the state of the man that she'd married once
And thought of as the only one
And as she looked back on the chances
That she'd passed up at home
Well, she quietly dumped pistol in a ditch
And she headed home alone
[Chorus]
[Outro]
You can never, never tell if the Law's about [x8]
Now, it was just like Frankie and Johnny
And it was just like Stagger Lee
Dolly Summers was a simple girl
From a mid-west family
With a stucco home and her own Mustang
And a charge account at sears
She had everything that a girl could want
To live happy for the rest of her years
But the thing that she wanted most of all
Was the thing that she had lost
To the arms of a downtown black jack hustler
By the name of Candy floss
They'd slipped town on a late night train
Heading for the west
Dolly slipped behind the wheel of her mustang
With a piece between her breast
[Chorus]
She put a pistol in her shoulder holster
She took her car up from Santa Fe
Yesterday morning she was washing dishes
Now she's hunting down a runaway
Don't judge a man by a misdemeanor
You may be sorry when his light goes out
Don't put that pistol in your shoulder holster
You can never, never tell if the Law's about
[Verse 5]
If it seemed just like a movie
Or a night of bad TV
They should have had a picture of Dolly's face
As she drove across the country
With daggers drawn for her fallen man
An venom in her heart
It was nearly dawn when she caught them up
Making out in a picnic park
But the thing that shook her rigid
As she fumbled for her gun
Was the state of the man that she'd married once
And thought of as the only one
And as she looked back on the chances
That she'd passed up at home
Well, she quietly dumped pistol in a ditch
And she headed home alone
[Chorus]
[Outro]
You can never, never tell if the Law's about [x8]
Blue Moves
- Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word
- Out of the Blue
- Your Starter for...
- Bite Your Lip (Get Up and Dance!)
- Idol
- If There’s a God in Heaven (What’s He Waiting For?)
- Where’s the Shoorah?
- Someone’s Final Song
- The Wide-Eyed and Laughing
- Between Seventeen and Twenty
- Shoulder Holster
- Crazy Water
- Cage the Songbird
- Boogie Pilgrim
- Chameleon
- One Horse Town
- Tonight
- Theme from a Non-Existent TV Series
- Blue Moves (1976)
- Your Song
- Rocket Man (I Think It’s Going to Be a Long, Long Time)
- Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
- Tiny Dancer
- Bennie and the Jets
- I’m Still Standing
- Can You Feel the Love Tonight (End Title)
- Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me
- Candle in the Wind
- Daniel
- Saturday Night’s Alright (for Fighting)
- Crocodile Rock
- I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues
- Candle in the Wind 1997
- Sacrifice
- Levon
- Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters
- Someone Saved My Life Tonight
- Border Song
- Honky Cat
- The One
- The Bitch is Back
- Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word
- Electricity (Billy Elliot)