Traveling wilburysTweeter and the monkey man were hard up for cashThey stayed up all night selling cocaine and hashTo an undercover cop who had a sister named janFor reasons unexplained she loved the monkey manTweeter was a boy scout before she went to vietnamAnd found out the hard way nobody gives a damnThey knew that they found freedom just across the jersey lineSo they hopped into a stolen car took highway 99(chorus)And the walls came down all the way to hellNever saw them when they’re standingNever saw them when they fellThe undercover cop never liked the monkey manEven back in childhood he wanted to see him in the canJan got married at fourteen to a rackateer named billShe made secret calls to the monkey man from a mansion on the hillIt was out on thunder road - tweeter at the wheelThey crashed into paradise - they could hear them tires squealThe undercover cop pulled up and said everyone of you’s a liarIf you don’t surrender now it’s gonna go down to the wire(chorus)An ambulance rolled up - a state trooper close behindTweeter took his gun away and messed up his mindThe undercover cop was left tied up to a treeNear the souvenir stand by the old abandoned factoryNext day the undercover cop was hot in pursuitHe was taking the whole thing personalHe didn’t care about the lootJan had told him many times it was you to me who taughtIn jersey anything’s legal as long as you don’t get caught(chorus)Someplace by rahway prison they ran out of gasThe undercover cop had cornered them said boy, you didn’tThink that this could lastJan jumped out of bed said there’s someplace I gotta goShe took a gun out of the drawer and said it’s best if you dont’ knowThe undercover cop was found face down in a fieldThe monkey man was on the river bridge using tweeter as a shieldJan said to the monkey man I’m not fooled by tweeter’s curlI knew him long before he ever became a jersey girl(chorus)Now the town of jersey city is quieting down againI’m sitting in a gambling club called the lion’s denThe tv set been blown up, every bit of it is goneEver since the nightly news show that the monkey man was onI guess I’ll to to florida and get myself some sunThere ain’t no more opportunity here, everything’s been doneSometime I think of tweeter, sometime I think of janSometime I don’t think about nothing but the monkey man(chorus)