How Come You Do Me Like You Do?

Subject: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: PHJim
Date: 03 Feb 20 - 03:49 PM

Last night I was listening to Stuff Smith singing "How Come You Do Me Like You Do?" and when I started playing along, I realised that I'd played those chord changes before.

Intro: D7 / G7 / |C / G7 / |

|:C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / G7 / |C / G7 / |
C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / / / |G7 / / / |
C / / / |C7 / / / |
F / / / |Cdim / / / |
C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / G7 / |C / A7 / |
D7 / G7 / |C / G7 / :|

Searching through my memory, I'd noticed some other songs with these changes, but had never noticed this one. Here are the ones I know. Can you add to my list?

-Bring It On Down - from Paul Geremia (Pink Anderson?)
-Boogie - John Hartford
-Alice's Restaurant - Arlo Guthrie
-Can't Tame Wild Women - Bill Boyd & His Cowboy Ramblers
-They're Red Hot - from Robert Johnson
-How Come You Do Me Like You Do? - Austin & Bergere 1924 (from Stuff Smith/ Greenbriar Boys)

An old song my Mom used to sing, JADA uses the same changes for the A part, but a different bridge.

|:C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / G7 / |C / G7 / |
C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / / / |G7 / / / |
C / D7 / |G7 / / / |
C / D7 / |G7 / / / |
C / B Bb |A / A7 / |D7 / G7 / |C / A7 / |
D7 / G7 / |C / G7 / :|

Can you add any?

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 03 Feb 20 - 05:05 PM

There was another thread about a year ago relating to this common ragtime chord progression. With slight variations, it crops up in countless songs, and uses the cycle of fifths, ie seventh chords that each lead into the next (eg E7, A7, D7, G7), and can be found in jazz standards like Sweet Georgia Brown, and dozens of country blues songs by the likes of Blind Blake, Bind Boy Fuller, Willie McTell, Lemon Jefferson, etc. However, don’t let me kill off the thread, because I too would be interested to hear of more examples.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: Stanron
Date: 03 Feb 20 - 07:01 PM

The cycle of fifths is really something different. These chord change intervals are sequential non-diatonic fourths. The function of each chord changes from dominant to secondary dominant and can lead to resolution on the tonic irrespective of where you start.

Did this type of sequence occur before the 20th century? It's all over the place in the US by the 1910s and 20s. Blind Willie McTell talked about learning 'Pal o' Mine' in 1917. Pal o' Mine uses this sequential non-diatonic fourth interval sequence.

That's a really clumsy mouthful but they are not fifths. Inverted fifths maybe but still, when did this use start?

Subject: Lyr Add: HOW COME YOU DO ME LIKE YOU DO?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 03 Feb 20 - 08:33 PM

Since these lyrics have never been posted at Mudcat before, we might as well post them here. These are from the sheet music found at Temple University:


HOW COME YOU DO ME LIKE YOU DO?
Words and music by Gene Austin & Roy Bergere, ©1924.

1. 'Way soon this mornin' I come rappin' at your door.
You kept me waitin' like you never did before.
That's a sure sign, brown skin, I'll never rap no more (no more).

CHORUS: How come you do me like you do, do, do?
How come you do me like you do?
Why do you try to make me feel so blue?
I ain't done nothin' to you.
[A] Do me right or else just let me be,
'Cause I can beat you doin' what you're doin' to me.
How come you do me like you do, do, do?
How come you do me like you do?

2. Sat up 'til daybreak; couldn't even sleep a wink.
My mind was wand'rin'; all I did was think and think.
The way I've been treated would drive a man to drink (to drink).

CHORUS: How come you do me like you do, do, do?
How come you do me like you do?
Why do you try to make me feel so blue?
I ain't done nothin' to you.
[B] If you rave I'll have to get you told,
For I can change your temp'rature from hot to cold.
How come you do me like you do, do, do?
How come you do me like you do?

PATTER: Don't I let you do just what I want you to?
Don't I let you cheer me up when I feel blue?
And when it comes to huntin' jobs, I never shirk.
I can always find a job but you won't go to work.
Don't I always try to let you have my way?
And still you treat me mean and meaner ev'ry day.
You better treat me right or let me be,
'Cause I can beat you doin' what you're doin' to me.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 04:37 AM

Fair enough, but why are these progressions commonly called cycles of fifths then?
Some might call them sevenths, but that’s more the individual composition of the chord themselves. Surely each is a fifth chord for a different key - E for A, A for D, D for G, and G fo C - but only the last one in the sequence (G7) resolves to the home key (C in this case), the rest being intermittent or false resolutions?

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: Stanron
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 07:23 AM

Hi Jerry. This is a question I ask myself. In European theory there was a German school and a Vienna school. They didn't agree on too much and then jazz happened.

The word '5th' here can have two distinct meanings. It can be the name of a chord in relation to the root. It is the number equivalent to the name 'Dominant'. So G is the 5th in the Key of C and it is also the Dominant chord in that key.

Alternatively a 5th can be, quite simply, an interval. Count upwards between any two notes inclusively and you get the interval. C D E F G, five notes is a 5th.

For those who are not familiar with the term, the diagram for the Cycle of fifths is widely available on line. Type circle or cycle of fifths into a search engine and look at the images.

You will see C at the top center. Going clockwise from there you get all the 5th intervals until you come back to C.

You'll notice that the sequence of chords mentioned in this thread is only found if you go anti clockwise around the circle. However if you go anti-clockwise around the diagram the intervals are inverted 5ths, or 4ths.

Modern theory appears to view chord sequences in terms of function. In this sequence the chords go through a recurring loop of being secondary dominant, dominant, tonic and then modulating. This loop continues until it reaches C which is the actual root and then it can stop. It's reached an audibly obvious end.

E7 A7 D7 G7 C

Functionally each chord is the 5th chord in the key of the chord that follows. It is also the secondary dominant to the chord that follows up to and including D7.

Whilst this is true isn't it all just a little bit too complicated?

Surely a musician playing along with this is not thinking "oh I've changed key!", "oh I've changed key!", "oh I've changed key!" at each chord change.

They will spot the pattern of repeated intervals and get to be able to predict what comes next and know when they get to root.

If you analyse chord sequences as a series of intervals you get to recognise patterns that functional analysis may not reveal.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 11:46 AM

Thanks for that. I can see what you mean about inverted fifths now, depending which way around you go on the old chord wheel. I don’t suppose many people are introduced to the wheel when taking up guitar and the like these days, although it helps to understand intervals if you learn to play verse one of Hallelujah - “it goes like this, fourth, the fifth...”

Going back to the original post, even the Beatles used that common sequence in When I’m Sixty Four - perhaps with a working title of Whether It’s Sixths or Fourths.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 02:36 PM

If you like messing around with chords, you might enjoy the work of this comedy-rock band from Australia called Axis of Awesome. They have written this "song" called "Four Chords" which is actually a pastiche of dozens of popular songs that all use the same 4 chords, played in the same sequence with the same rhythm. They have made at least 2 versions, maybe more.

Here's a concert performance from 2009 on YouTube, and a true video from 2011.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 03:05 PM

Very good, probably brilliant if you know all those songs, which I confess I don’t. However, you can do a similar medley of songs from the catalogue of 12 bar blues, plus the standard sixteen bar bluegrass and ragtime blues repertoires. And I gather someone has already done the same for the standard pattern of country music songs.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Writer in the Sky
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 03:33 PM

I don't think of each separate "tonicization" in a chain of secondary dominants--in such cases, I just think "secondary dominants" or whatever my internal shorthand for that is. However, I do think of temporary tonics when I see V-I, ii-V (or iiø-V), ii-V-I or vi-ii-V subsequences (in keys other than the main one) embedded within such fifth progession chains. Temporary tonicizations are implied by the chord types used in fifths chains--and vice versa. So by thinking of the temporary tonics, I can more easily memorize and recall the appropriate chord types, as well as follow these sequences easily on the fretboard.

Come to that, stray chords (like the Bb7 in the first post) often turn out to be tritone substitutions in fifth progressions. In the first post, the Bb7 chord can be seen as a tritone substitution of some kind of III chord (Em, E7, Em7...), so from B on we essentially have a 7-3-6-2-5-1 fifth progression, mostly of secondary dominants. D7 could also be replaced by a tritone substitution (like Ab7 or Ab7b5), adding a little color and continuing the initial chromatic root descent even farther. You might even try Ab9, Ab9b5 or Ab9#5, particularly if you follow with G9 rather than plain G7.

To take the chain a couple of steps farther: in the sheet music, the chords in the first few bars of the chorus (as extracted from the piano part) run like this:
1 4 | 1_b77- 6[7]_6ø | 27 59_57+ | 1[6] |
Note the 4 in the first measure. Now, in fifth progressions involving the 4th, it's common to short-circuit the path around the circle (and avoid a slew of non-diatonic roots) by moving the 4 root by a tritone rather than fifth, thus to 7 rather than to b7. If for the second 1 we substitute 7 (the B chord which occurs in the corresponding position in the first post), we end up with a complete short-circuited fifths circle. In simplified form this is:
1 4 | 7_3 6 | 2 5 | 1
Pretty nifty, eh?

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 04:24 PM

Getting back to the song HOW COME YOU DO ME LIKE YOU DO I listened to several early recorded versions on the Internet Archive, and I found the following variant couplets substituted for the italicized lines in the above lyrics:

[C] You might be the meanest gal [or "man"] in town,
But I'm just mean enough to turn your damper down.

[D] I sit in your parlor just as dumb as a lamb,
But I ain't too dumb to hear your back door slam.

[E] I'll lay your head on a railroad line,
Let the train come along and pacify your mind

[F] I'll get a shovel before I'm done.
If you haven't got a home I'm gonna dig you one.

[G] If you ain't got a home before I'm done,
I'll get myself a shovel and I'll dig you one.

Frank Crumit sings verse 1, chorus C, verse 2, chorus B, patter, chorus D.

Marion Harris sings verse 1, chorus C, patter, instrumental break, chorus E, chorus F.

Rudy Vallee sings verse 1, chorus C, patter, instrumental break, chorus E, chorus G.

The above recordings can be found here:

Frank Crumit, Victor (19437-A), 1924.
Marion Harris, Brunswick (2610-B), 1924.
Rudy Vallee and His Connecticut Yankees, Victor (22445-B), 1930.

The following early recordings are instrumental only:

The Original Memphis Five, Victor (19480-A), 1924.
Original Memphis Five, Perfect (14322), 1924-09-11.
The Original Memphis Five, Brunswick (3630-B), 1927-08.
Jack Linx and His Society Serenaders, Okeh (40192-A), 1924-08-28.
Fletcher Henderson and His Orchestra, Banner (1445-B), 1924-11-17.
Gene Rodemich's Orchestra, Brunswick (2824-B), 1925-01-19.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 05:42 PM

Thanks for that, Writer. Very impressive but you lost me a bit when you got onto tritone substitutions, but then I gave up chord theory in favour of playing toons years back, after depping on banjo with a trad jazz band and getting out of my depth.

Subject: RE: How Come You Do Me Like You Do?
From: PHJim
Date: 04 Feb 20 - 06:52 PM

Lead Belly sang:

How come you do me like you do do do?
How come you do me like you do?
How come you do me like you do do do?
I ain't done nothin' to you
Once you were steady, once you were true,
Now Mama, Sweet Papa can't even depend on you
How come you do me like you do do do?
How come you do me like you do?

Here's the version that prompted this thread:
Stuff Smith with Herb Ellis - How Come You Do Me...

I'm sure I've heard The Greenbriar Boys do this too.