You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: cnd
Date: 15 Apr 21 - 11:44 PM

A version of this song under the name "Our Goodman" by Will Starks (1942, Clarksdale, Mississippi) doesn't have the man as a drunkard, but instead as a formerly blind man who travels to a far away land to get his sight back. You can hear lit here.

The lyrics to me aren't significantly different from any of the other versions here aside from not mentioning alcohol at all, even in calling him a drunkard.

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: meself
Date: 16 Apr 21 - 12:27 AM

I would have mentioned this in another thread on the subject, I'm sure, but Sonny Boy Williamson II (Rice Miller) recorded a bluesy version - can't recall the title.

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 16 Apr 21 - 05:04 AM

Jack Elliott of Birtley in Co Durham,NE England sang a version of this & it was recorded for a Folkways LP in 1961 called 'Songas of a Durham Mining Family'.
As for the seven verses, Joe Heaney of Connemara sang them all, but I heard him sing the last verse in Irish at the Marsden folk club in South Shields in the 60s....

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: GUEST,Brad Sondahl
Date: 16 Apr 21 - 08:57 AM

It reminds me of the tactless remarks always made in the British series Allo Allo when he says to his wife, when caught with the bar maid, "You stupid woman," and comes up with a seriously preposterous excuse...

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: Brian Peters
Date: 17 Apr 21 - 06:23 AM

'A version of this song under the name "Our Goodman" by Will Starks (1942, Clarksdale, Mississippi)'

Thanks 'cnd', I've not heard that one before - another interesting example of an African-American version of this old English ballad (see also Coley Jones' 'Drunkard's Special' and Blind Lemon's 'Cat Man Blues'). A Cajun band called The Jolly Boys of Lousiana recorded it as 'Old Man Crip' as well.

Will Starks also sang a very different but recognizable version of the song the English folk scene knows as 'Dido Bendigo'. And, while trying to find out more about him, I came across a fascinating article on African-American button accordion players. A pleasing bit of serendipity, arising from your link - thanks!

Afro-Mississippi accordionists

Subject: RE: You blind fool you drunken fool/4 Nights Drunk
From: keberoxu
Date: 18 Apr 21 - 11:15 AM

First version I ever heard was the long-playing album,
The Weavers at Home.

Ronnie Gilbert, at the right moment, sings the words:

You old fool, you blind fool,
Can't you plainly see,
It's nothing but a ... my mother sent to me ...

The man's part is taken, as a solo, in the stentorian voice of
Lee Hays,
who after all the singing is done,
throws in a spoken 'stage aside':

"It's a good thing I'm not of a suspicious nature!"

FINAL CHORD: BOOM.