"anyone out there have an idea as to what he was talking about? Just being the biggest dog on the block, or what? Anyone have an idea?"

Gypsy, I think you nailed it. I think the man is bragging in that song that he is 'bad] [bad meaning very good]*. I think the singer is rapping [in the old meaning of that word], trying to impress Eileen so she will become 'his lady.

* Michael Jackson's "Bad" is in this braggadocio tradition, and so are many Blues, Calypso, Hip-Hop songs.

Here are my guesses about some of the lines of the song in question:

When the singer says "I walked 47 miles of barbed wire,
he saying he was locked up [behind barbed wire] and survived that...[???]

When he said "I used a cobra snake for a necktie,
I got a brand new house on the roadside,
Made out of rattlesnake hide." he was braggin about how he was so bad he not only killed the cobra snake but he made it in to a necktie...Maybe ditto for the rattlesnake, but in any event those who see the house made out of rattlesnake hide will know he got the power...

Why are snakes "bad"[meaning good?]snakes are mean because they strike without warning. Their venom needs powerful antidotes to avert death.

And speaking of power, these snakes skins probably also give the singer mojo because of their cultural [if not religious] symbolism. Snakes have long been of heavy duty spiritual importance and symbolism. In traditional Africa and elsewhere snakes have been symbols of wisdom and seeing a small snake in the house may mean that an ancestor or positive spirit is visiting that person.

Do a google search on the symbolism of snakes; snake worship; Papa Loa; voodoo; Orisha vodu; Yoruba Religion, Nigeria & Benin West Africa.

Back to that song, I think that the lines "There's a little bitty chimney built up on top, Made out of a human skull." are made in the in the self-boasting tradition of African Diaspora songs [I'm so bad I ahow off what I do, even to putting the human skull on the top of my chimney". This may show that he has the power to deal death [cause death]. And it may also mean that he is mocking death [see the next lines "I got a tombstone hand and a graveyard mind,
I'm just 22 and I don't mind dyin'".

Note that this "I aint afraid of dying" meme is throughout hip-hop compositions.

As to the line "Who do you love?" it almost strikes me as saying "given all I said, how could you not love me?". I can't remember what Blues song has this title/line, but it reminds me of "Take a Whiff of me now".

These are only guesses. And they may or may not be what was going on in the song composers head. But I'm thinking that some folks listening to that song may have 'gotten' these not so very coded messages from those lines.

****

Btw, since I believe that the voodoo/human sacrifice connection is a Hollywood creation, I don't think that song's line about the human skull has any voodoo reference.

-Azizi