Lyr Add: East Texas Talking Blues

Subject: Lyr Add: EAST TEXAS TALKING BLUES
From: Stewie
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 09:27 PM

EAST TEXAS TALKING BLUES
(Traditional)

Intro: Stoppin' in to some café along the road, you're liable to run into somebody with a guitar, just as well as not. Round that part of the country, pretty frequent, you'll hear something like this (plays and mumbles). You notice he ain't singin' at all, just talkin' along. They call them things the talkin' blues – the East Texas talkin' blues. Some of them goes like this:

Down in the wildwood sittin' on a log
Finger on the trigger, eye on a hog
Pulled the trigger and the gun went zip
And I caught that hog with all me grip
He got away
I didn't need him anyhow
Had a lot of fun shootin' him though

I got a gal six feet tall
Sleeps in the kitchen with her feet in the hall
Eatin' hog eyes
Spittin' out chittlins
She just loves icecream
Yeah, 'specially with gravy

I was out in the henhouse, down on my knees
And I thought I heard a chicken sneeze
It weren't nothin' but a rooster, sayin' his prayers
Thankin' his lord for the hens upstairs
Oh my, such carryings-on you never did see

Oh, the other day I took me a wife
And I got a little son who's the pride of my life
Who rubs mashed potato in my hair
Slides string beans up my nose
And says, 'You're my pa, ain't you ?
Dis-gusting!

You're liable to hear them things as long as you can hang on and keep drinkin' coffee. Hundreds of them.

Source: Jack Elliott 'Ramblin' Jack' Topic TSCD477. Originally on Jack Elliott 'Muleskinner' Topic LP 12T106.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: East Texas Talking Blues
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 10:03 PM

Sounds awful close kin to the original verse in Woody's Talking Blues:

Got me a wife about five years ago
Got a little boy now, he's jest about fo'
Gets up on the table, slaps his maw
Hits me in the chin an' sez "Aincha my paw?"

Rubs string beans in my ears...mashed potatos in my hair
But he's a cure kin......yeah

A

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: East Texas Talking Blues
From: Amos
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 10:04 PM

Sorry that's "cute kid", not "cure kin". Kinda like fryin' mends....

A

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: East Texas Talking Blues
From: Art Thieme
Date: 28 Jan 00 - 10:35 PM

"The Original Talkin' Blues" was a 78 rpm record by CHRIS BOUCHILLON---1928 if I recall. The other side was a fine song also: "Hannah". I did it for years. So did Michael Cooney.

Art