Songfacts®:

• Released in 1977, Running On Empty is Jackson Browne's love letter, or perhaps more accurately, a weary sigh, dedicated to life on the road. Nestled within the album is "Shaky Town," a song penned by Browne's guitarist and friend Danny Kortchmar, that depicts the relentless cycle of tour life.
• The song is a paean to the realities of constant travel, one-night stands, the indistinguishable motel rooms, and the ever-present hum of 18-wheelers rolling down the highway like mechanical lullabies. Kortchmar borrowed the title from CB radio slang for Los Angeles, known for its propensity for earthquakes.
  
  This young man feels
  Those eighteen wheels
  That keep turning 'round to take me down to Shaky Town
  
  The song is soaked in resignation as the young man is caught in a continuous cycle of travel, with Los Angeles a frequent destination.
• Kortchmar told Uncut magazine that he wrote the song during the downtime between touring with James Taylor and heading out with Jackson Browne. At the time, CB radios were the Twitter of truckers with their endless chatter, colorful slang, and a whole lexicon of road-bound wisdom. Inspired by this, Kortchmar worked some of the lingo into "Shaky Town" and played it one night for Browne in Denver. Browne's response was enthusiastic: "Oh, we gotta record it!"
• The Running on Empty album took the idea of capturing the road experience and ran with it. Browne and his band recorded the entire album while on the road, in various locations including stages, dressing rooms, tour buses, and hotel rooms. "Shaky Town" was captured in the humble confines of Room 124 of the Holiday Inn in Edwardsville, Illinois. Kortchmar sang harmony vocals and played lead guitar on the song.