What is “Saturday Night Salvation” about?
"Saturday Night Salvation" swaps the church for the honky-tonk. The narrator spends the week working for a man who doesn't know his name, then finds his healing on the weekend, with beer for communion, a steel guitar in place of a steeple and a room of sinners getting free for a night. The bridge raises a toast to single mothers, old men and brokenhearted kids before the refrain "we found church in this bar." Second on The Last Porch Light, it keeps the album's opening stretch in Friday-night spirits.
Saturday Night Salvation lyrics
I've been working all week for a man who don't know my name
Pushing papers, pulling cables, every day's the same
But when that clock hits five on Friday I'm a different man
I grab my keys, I grab my girl, and we got ourselves a plan
We're heading where the lights are low and the music's way too loud
Where everybody knows the words and they're singing them out proud
Monday through Friday I'm somebody's fool
But Friday night to Sunday I rewrite all the rules
Saturday night salvation, come and get your healing here
Cold beer communion, confess it to your peers
We don't need a steeple we just need a steel guitar
A dance floor, an open door, and a sky full of stars
Saturday night salvation
Everybody raise your jar
Tommy's got his fiddle and Maria's got the voice
Big Earl's behind the bar and he's pouring liquid joy
The whole town's packed in shoulder tight and nobody wants to leave
We're all just here to feel alive and have a reason to believe
That the work ain't all there is and the bills ain't all that's real
That somewhere in between the songs we remember how to feel
We ain't perfect people and we ain't trying to be
Just a room full of sinners getting temporary free
Saturday night salvation, come and get your healing here
Cold beer communion, confess it to your peers
We don't need a steeple we just need a steel guitar
A dance floor, an open door, and a sky full of stars
Saturday night salvation
Everybody raise your jar
To the single mamas dancing with their shoes kicked off
To the old man in the corner singing everything he's got
To the kid who just turned twenty-one and thinks he owns the world
To every broken-hearted boy and every wild-eyed girl
This one's for you, this one's for all of us tonight
Saturday night salvation, we're all getting saved tonight
Cold beer communion, and every soul's invited
We don't need a sermon just this band and this bar
A dance floor, an open door, and every single star
Saturday night salvation
Hallelujah raise your jar
Saturday night salvation
Yeah we found church in this bar
We found church in this bar
Oh, we found church in this bar