Lyr Req: Keep Your Hands Off Her (Big Bill Broonzy

Subject: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 08:10 AM

A version of this song, titled "Take Your Fingers Off It", appears in the DT. Big Bill Broonzy's version has the same tune and a similar chorus, but the verses are different. Anyone know Big Bill's verses?

Thanks in advance,

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: PoppaGator
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 06:55 PM

Would I be correct in guessing that this is the same song, or nearly so, as Leadbelly's "Keep Your Hands Off Her," snippets of which are included in Chris Smithers' classic long-form song/narration "Fare Thee, Titanic, Fare Thee Well" ~ ?

Subject: Lyr Add: KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF HER (Leadbelly)
From: Leadbelly
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:02 PM

If so, here comes Leadbelly's version ( contributed by Nathan of Texas):

KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF HER
(Huddie Ledbetter)

Keep your hands off, keep your hands off her,
Keep your hands off her, keep your hands off her,
Keep your hands off her, you know what I said,
You know she don't belong to you.

She's a heavy-hipped mama, she's got the great big legs.
She's a heavy-hipped mama, she's got the great big legs.
She's a heavy-hipped mama, she's got the great big legs.
Walking like she walkin' on soft boiled eggs.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: Peace
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:03 PM

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:ACXpRd3ipu4J:play.rhapsody.com/album/bluesrootsofrocknroll/keepyourhandsoffher+keep+your+han

Subject: Lyr Add: KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF HER (Leadbelly)
From: Leadbelly
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:10 PM

And this is Leadbelly's complete version:

Keep Your Hands Off Her

Keep your hands off, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, you know what I said
You know she don't belong to you

She's a heavy-hipped1 mama, she's go the great big legs
She's a heavy-hipped mama, she's got the great big legs
She's a heavy-hipped mama, she's got the great big legs
Walking like she walkin' on soft boiled eggs

Keep your hands off, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, you know what I said
You know she don't belong to you

Her name is Josie and she ain't so nosey
Her name is Josie and she ain't so nosey
Her name is Josie and she ain't so nosey
But boy, she sure is cosey

Keep your hands off, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, you know what I said
You know she don't belong to you

She's a heavy-hipped mama and she's built up straight
She's a heavy-hipped mama and she's built up straight
She's a heavy-hipped mama and she's built up straight
She's got just what it takes

Keep your hands off, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, keep your hands off her
Keep your hands off her, you know what I said
You know she don't belong to you

Subject: Lyr Add: KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF HER (Big Bill Broonzy
From: Leadbelly
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:17 PM

Last but not least, Big Bill's version:

Keep Your Hands Off Her 2:55 Trk 7
(William Broonzy)
Big Bill Broonzy - vocal & guitar
w/Black Bob - piano, B. Settles - bass
Recorded: Studio C. Chicago, IL, October 31, 1935
Original issue Bluebird 6188/BS-96320
Album: Bluebird Vol. 3 'That's Chicago's South Side'
BMG Music 63988-2
Transcriber: [e-mail]



(piano rag)

I've got a gal here in this town
Don't want nobody to bother but me
I've got a gal here in this town
Don't want nobody to bother but me
'Cause she's strickly, tailor made
Boy, she ain't no hand-me-down
Catch you messin' with her, boy
I'll sho' shoot ya down

Now, keep yo' hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
You know she don't belong to you
You know she don't belong to you
Oh, keep yo' hands off her
Now, don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you

Keep yo' hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you
She got some little bitty hands
An them great big legs
She sho' look good
'Cause ev'rybody says it

But keep yo' hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
You know she don't belong to you
Told you last night
You know she don't belong to you
(piano)

Oh, keep yo' hands off her
Now, don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you
Keep yo' hand off her
Now, don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you

She got some real dark eyes
An that real curly hair
Big Bill, is gonna follow
That woman ev'rywhere

Keep yo' hands off her
Told ya, don't ya dare to touch her
You know she don't belong to you
Told you last night
You know she don't belong to you

Keep yo' hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you
Keep yo' hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you

Now you can look her up
An you can look her down
She got a heaven, boy
Ain't never been found

But keep your hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
You know she don't belong to you
You know she don't belong to you

Oh, keep your hands off her
Don't ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you
Keep yo' hands off her
Told ya dare to touch her
Know she don't belong to you

Oh, watch her, boy
Right as she pass by
Because the day I'll catch you wit' her
Boy, that's the day you gon' die

Keep yo' hands off her
Told ya dare to touch her
You know she don't belong to you
Know she don't belong to you.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broo
From: Joe_F
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 09:19 PM

To me, there is a difference in meaning between "her" and "it". I suspect that the song requested is a more vulgar one, but I can't find it at the moment.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: Peace
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 10:02 PM

"Keep Your Hands Off Of It recorded by Elvis on Friday, 5 June, 1970
Written by: Foster
Originally recorded by Billy Hughes And His Pecos Pals in 1946
Hear Elvis's version on: Walk A Mile In My Shoes—The Essential 70's Masters Disc 3
Others identify far older numbers as the original, including for example, Coot Grant and Kid Wilson's 1932 "Keep Your Hands Off My Mojo" and Leadbelly's "Keep your Hands Off Her" (along with numerous other candidates, too many to list). None of these, however, match in tune or lyrics the song that Elvis sang, even if the sentiment might be similar. Both this number and "Got My Mojo Working" seem to come from the same root, the one developing more in the Country area, the other (Mojo) in the R&B area. The 1946 release "Take Your Hands Off It (Birthday Cake)" by Billy Hughes And His Pecos Pals, a Country Swing with very suggestive lyrics, approaches the number performed by Elvis and so is tentatively suggested as the original."

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 10 Apr 07 - 08:29 AM

The lyrics provided by Leadbelly are the ones I requested. Thanks a bunch, Leadbelly! Of course, it is not the same song as Huddie Ledbetter sang. But then, what song was the same after Huddie got ahold of it. His "House of the Rising Sun" is way different than any other version I've ever heard.

Thanks again, to everybody. Need I mention this kind of help is why I love this site? Thanks, Max.

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broo
From: Jeremiah McCaw
Date: 10 Apr 07 - 10:09 AM

Apparently, not either song, but I saw somewhere in print (might even have been in a long forgotten issue of Sing Out!) a song called "Take Your Fingers Off It" that went, in part:

Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you
Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you
Two old maids lyin' together in bed
One turned to the other & she said:
Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you

Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you
Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you
Just one thing I'll never understand -
Why a bow-legged woman wants a knock-kneed man
Take your fingers off it & don't you dare touch it;
You know it don't belong to you

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broo
From: Leadbelly
Date: 10 Apr 07 - 12:32 PM

Not at all! My pleasure, Roger,

Manfred

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Take Your Hands Off It, Big Bill Broonzy
From: Roger in Baltimore
Date: 10 Apr 07 - 12:39 PM

Jeremiah,

That is the song that is in the data base. It was the one with which I was familiar. I, too, cannot remember where I picked it up. Big Bill uses the same tune, just different words.

Roger in Baltimore

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Keep Your Hands Off Her (Big Bill Broonzy
From: GUEST,song detective
Date: 22 Sep 10 - 12:33 PM

Wow! I struck gold here! About all that's missing is that ancient thing "Keep Your Hands Off My Mojo" but this fellow says he's heard it, and it's not the same as Elvis's. You can hear him stumble in the beginning, as if deciding which way to take the thing - he would never actually write something down, of course: it happened at the microphone, or it didn't happen. Which is the blues, by the way. Fascinating. But he knew where it came from. {But did he know where it went? And was he any kind of conduit? No way to ever know what old stuff was banged out on guitars backstage on those long, exhausting early tours. In '70, Elvis says that it's just "mediocre [expletive deleted]; we grew up with it - it's not good, it's not bad, just mediocre [expletive deleted]"} Anyway, that ancient tune - "off my mojo" is mentioned by the intrepid fellow who runs "The Originals" site on Elvis. Great site: hundreds of songs, with roots and branches! He said that when he started, he thought it would be easy. He even includes tunes sung in between "real" songs - most of which should have been replaced by THIS kind of music. Because even though it's just "fooling around" type music, it is the bedrock of what became popular music in our time. Which suggests perhaps he never did make the connection between all these songs with the same root and the huge hit. Or didn't want to think about it.
"The Originals" guy DOES leave one out, of course, because I dunno, it's sacred or something, clearly. But it's the most famous, for sure. And it more or less stopped the progress of the root into more branches.
Anyway, it's that rhythmic chant that I keep hearing in these "possession or else" song:
"A nickel is a nickel/
A dime is a dime/
A house full of children/
None of them {are} mine
--------------

If you just SAY it aloud, you can feel the familiarity of the rhythm and type of rhyme: first there's Robert Johnson: "One for a nickel/Two for a dime . . ." And I don't recall the resolution, but it's the same feel, right there. Except that in Johnson's songster blues, he says "One for . . ." then "Two for . . ." and all of a sudden, with that, we come to the final song in this whole root. And you ALL know what it is. Huge hit.
It starts out "One for . . . "Two for . . ." and then says that you can do ANYTHING except to do something that would scuff up this object. It takes another object {for Johnson it was Hot Tomales, which he remembered to warn you not to "mess with"}, a new object, or as Chuck Berry later said "I'm a givin' you a warnin'"
It has "don't you!" as a key phrase relating what you cannot do to the object, which is simply to touch it hard, really, or to defile it in some way - not take it, not steal it, but just touch it in such a way to ruin its purity. Or like another song in the root-branches of this piece, "Cold Icy Fingers" - The Originals site says it's part of the root, and branches, and you know that the songs tell you what you CAN do - a lot of personal stuff {!}, and then what you can't touch, which is skin. Always, always possession. This time, though, it's a bizarre object to protect - unless you're a clothing nut - {or it's a double entendre, which it is}, not a diamond ring, tomales, or anything like that. But SHOES, of all things. And you are not warned about taking them or stealing them: you may not cause them to be scuffed. That's all. {Which is a sexual allusion to "ruination" of some kind of purity. All those children, and "none of them mine." She's pure.} Since "Cold, Icy Fingers" says to keep your "fingers offa" his SKIN, in this tune, well, it's a different kind of skin: buckskin.
If you look up your Freud, I believe he connects shoes to being a female symbol because, well because it's obvious. It is a double entendre {sp?}, like almost all of these songs. My question, of course, is why wouldn't the WRITER KNOW that it is? Unless his unconscious is running wild, he ought to know, and also ought to know many of these other songs! So it really IS about "a girl" after all - of course. "Why," Perkins asked Cash, "would I want to sing about shoes, when I could sing about a pretty girl?" He apparently never got the joke of the song he is said to have written, but we see it written long ago, again and again, just differently.
Is there any evidence that Perkins {who purloined Blind Lemon Jefferson's matchbox without missing a beat} ever performed, let alone heard one of 'em, and understood the gag. We know another guy on tour with him at that time, who won a talent contest with "Cold, Icy Fingers" {"Offa me" - and lists a buncha stuff you CAN do except that - no women this time; just a man and ghosts, and a man and apparently a male doctor, etc. - and that's gettin' close - "you can cure my ills with your powders and your pills, but keep them them cold icy fingers offa me." I may have missed a word, but that's it. It's on this site.} Interesting that, in one telling, Perkins says he wrote it "in bed." {Another time, he famously said it was written before he went on stage, on "a paper sack"} The sexual meanings are in these songs too, even when they're "clean." Well, like I said, it's called a double entendre! And anyone dipping into this group of songs should already know that, for sure. Old blues thing that crossed over to country via western swing. But the rhythm is there, and even that bit about "one" and "two" or "nickel" and "dime" and so on. Originally, the last line of the intro was "go, man, go" not "cat." Intriguing because a film about the Harlem Globetrotters in the earlier fifties was called "Go, Man, Go."
It would be fascinating if anyone, after all these lyrics that they "grew up with," could claim it was just a coincidence. THAT is stretching credulity, in my view. What we cannot know is HOW this happened. We'll just never know for sure. But keep track of the dates, and fib-bombs start to go off. Even though it was Cash who started it, and this is admitted, I don't think he was the true instigator. After all, Perkins had to sue years later for his royalties. He didn't know about BMI.
The question is this: from WHOM did it come? And that is hidden in the cold icy hands of death. All we know is that in Oct. 1994, Perkins made up a sweet story of another, long dead, singer's generosity in NOT recording the song {he did, BTW - and promoted it on TV BEFORE he did so}. Then, Perkins reached his arm toward the Heavens and said "King, here's OUR song!" It was a shocking moment, especially to those who knew something of the history of the other singer's familiarty with the various version of "Hands Off" and won a contest with "Cold Icy Fingers." Perkins only had a few years to live. If he did not know the complex history of this folk treasure trove, he might have felt burdened; he certainly didn't get the double meaning - the joke hidden in it, but we can never, ever know. Well, actually, it belonged to lots of people, when you think about it.

I hope everyone on this board has read the book about "House of the Rising Sun" and its travels on the way to "popularity." Except that is not near so mysterious as this chase. I love his conclusion. And in his case, it is so true. In this case, nothing is very clear, except perhaps to one or two or three people, all of whom who are dead.

Song Detective