The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #136166   Message #3108153
Posted By: GUEST,RoberM
06-Mar-11 - 12:19 PM
Thread Name: Dian James & the Greenbriar Boys LP
Subject: LYR ADD: Giving Everything Away
This was one of few recordings that Dian James recorded, most music on the LP was in the bluegrass style,
but what changed things entirely was her amazingly powerful voice, one of the best I've heard
in any popular music genre.
The best song on the album (In My Opinion) was
Dian's and the Greenbriar Boys version
of the song "New Givin' Everything Away,
(just called "Giving Everything Away" on the LP)
written by Clayton McMichen of the Skillet Lickers
and performed by Riley Puckett. I'm not sure I have all the lyrics correct here, but here they are anyway:

------------------------------
(New) Givin' Everything Away

Recording Source: Dián James and the Greenbriar Boys (LP & CD Elektra Records)
and Riley Puckett (JSP Box - Country Music Pioneer)


I know a gal, she lived on a farm,
she's got corn in the crib and hay in the barn.
She had an old cow she milked every day,
she wouldn't sell the milk and butter,
she just gave it away - She had a habit:
Giving everything away.


She had chickens in the coop, pigs in the pen,
flower in the bowl and wheat in the bin.
This old gal she lived away down south,
she had plenty of meat and had a smokehouse.
She wouldn't sell it, she just like to give it away.


She got tired of the country, wouldn't farm no more.
She moved to town, got job in a store.
She was doin' fine till one day when:
Lord, they caught her givin' goods away to the men,
she had a habit: givin' everything away.


Now, she lost her job; she didn't care -
she went to a honky-tonk and drank some beer.
She drank some corn-liqour and some homebrew(ed) too;
Lordy Goodness know what it made her do -
She had a habit: Giving everything way.