The redoubtable Bay Area a cappella trio, Oak Ash & Thorn (I'm not exactly sure what redoubtable means, but I think it's good), do a song that sounds like it was derived from one I found long ago in the Oak publication The Coffeehouse Songbook, called "S-A-V-E-D" (a/k/a "It's G-L-O-R-Y to Know I'm S-A-V-E-D").   

According to The Ballad Index, the song was first recorded by Gid Tanner and the Skillet Lickers in 1926, but nobody seems to know who wrote it. It was also recorded by the Blue Sky Boys in 1981. I was able to find the lyrics online--in a sermon! They're the same ones I remember learning in 1969, except that in the songbook, "BOBBED" was intentionally misspelled as "BOBED", so it scanned.

Anybody have any more info on this song, or on the OA&T version that ends "Tra-la-la, amen"? That version leaves out the idea of hypocrisy, but simply says, They're sinners, we're saved.

Here are the lyrics:



S-A-V-E-D

Some folks jump up and down all night, and D-A-N-C-E
while others go to church to show their brand new H-A-T
and on their face they put great gobs of P-A-I-N-T
and then they'll have the brass to say they're S-A-V-E-D

I know some girls in this town who are so N-I-C-E
they do their hair in the latest styles, yes, B-O-B-B-E-D
they go to parties every night, drink W-I-N-E
and then they'll have the brass to say they're S-A-V-E-D

I've seen some boys lean back and puff their S-M-O-K-E
while others chew and spit out all their J-U-I-C-E
they play their cards and shoot their guns and drink their P-O-P
and then they'll have the brass to say they're S-A-V-E-D

I know a man I think his name's B-R-O-W-N
he prays for prohibition and he votes for G-I-N
He helps to put the poison in his neighbor's C-U-P
and then he'll have the brass to say he's S-A-V-E-D

chorus:

It's G-L-O-R-Y to know I'm S-A-V-E-D
I'm H-A-P-P-Y because I'm F-R-Double E
I once was B-O-U-N-D by the chains of S-I-N
But its V-I-C-T-O-R-Y to know I've Christ within."


I can probably make a MIDI file of the tune, given sufficient time and if asked nicely.

Aloha,
Mark