Live Oak Chords
by Jason Isbell
Live Oak by Jason Isbell is a moderately challenging guitar song played in the key of Am with a capo on the 4st fret. It uses the chords Am, Cmaj9, C, Dm, Am7 and Fmaj7. Use the transpose and diagram tools on this page to change the key, see each shape, or simplify the chords.
(Am) (Cmaj9) (C)
There's a man who walks beside me he is who I used to be,
(Dm) (Am7) (Fmaj7)
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
(Am) (Cmaj9) (C)
And I wonder who she's pining for on nights I'm not around
(Fade in) Dm Am7 Fmaj7
Could it be the man who did the things I'm living down
Am Cmaj9 C
I was rougher than the timber shipping out of Fond du Lac
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
When I headed south at seventeen, the sheriff on my back
Am Cmaj9 C
I'd never held a lover in my arms or in my gaze,
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
So I found another victim every couple days
Am Cmaj9 C
But the night I fell in love with her, I made my weakness known
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
To the fighters and the farmers digging dusty fields alone
Am Cmaj9 C
The jealous innuendos of the lonely-hearted men
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
Let me know what kind of country I was sleeping in
Am Cmaj9 C
Well you couldn't stay a loner on the plains before the war
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
When my neighbors took to slightin' me, I had to ask what for
Am Cmaj9 C
Rumors of my wickedness had reached our little town
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
Soon she'd heard about the boys I used to hang around
Am Cmaj9 C
We'd robbed a great-lakes freighter, killed a couple men aboard
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
When I told her, her eyes flickered like the sharp steel of a sword
Am Cmaj9 C
All the things that she'd suspected, I'd expected her to fear
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
Was the truth that drew her to me when I landed here
Am Cmaj9 C
There's a man who walks beside me he is who I used to be,
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
And I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me
Am Cmaj9 C
And I wonder who she's pining for on nights I'm not around
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
Could it be the man who did the things I'm living down
Am Cmaj9 C
Dm Am7 Fmaj7 x2
Am Cmaj9 C
Well I carved her cross from live oak and her box from short-leaf pine,
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
and buried her so deep, she'd touch the water table line
Am Cmaj9 C
And picked up what I needed and I headed south again
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
To myself, I wondered, "Would I ever find another friend"
Am Cmaj9 C
There's a man who walks beside her, he is who I used to be,
Dm Am7 Fmaj7
and I wonder if she sees him and confuses him with me