Howdy,

Someone brought this thread to my attention. I play in the New Roanoke Jug Band & thought I would address the minor departures which Stewie points out.
While very little is known about Wilmer Watts, we know he was from the North Carolina Piedmont region, and that some of his other songs (notably Cotton Mill Blues) suggest that he worked the cotton mills in that area. His version of Been on the Job Too Long appears to be a commentary on the labor troubles which took place in the mills in the early 1900s as mill owners fought the organization of unions int their mills. We changed the text to set the song here, where the town constable works at the behest of the mill owner and workers who cause trouble may wind up dead if they persist in their attempts to organize a union.

Mostly, we love the songs and playing style of Wilmer Watts and the Lonely Eagles and wish more of their recordings were available on reissue projects.