Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)

Subject: Lyr Add: ALL GO HUNGRY HASH HOUSE (Dave Macon)
From: Les B
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 12:20 AM

I cannot make out some of the words in this Uncle Dave Macon classic - can anyone fill in where the "???" are?
(Or any other errors that you may see!)

ALL GO HUNGRY HASH HOUSE
Uncle Dave Macon and his Fruit Jar Drinkers with Sam McKee

Banjo riff - Spoken: Hello folks, I'm in New York and from the country, but you can't tell me, don't you tell me, roastin' ears ain't corn.

There's a hotel in the city as we climb the golden stairs
(There's a hotel down the street where the tramps and hoboes meet - Coffer Bros.)
And they serve the hash up on the second floor
There's a graveyard in the cellar, Doctor's office in the parlour
And the undertaker keeps his shop next door

"Touch Me Not" is on the teacups; skeleton cross bones on the plates
???????????????????????????????????????????????????
Oh the biscuits they are named, and I'm going to have them framed
At that all go hungry hash house where I dwell

Oh the donuts they are wooden and we have Limburger puddin'
We kneel in prayer before we go to grub
If you chance to get a breeze of that Ambelonious cheese
You'd have swore somebody'd hit you with a club

That hotel where I stay, it is turning my hair gray
And the landlord is always full of beer
Oh the bedbugs must have rented, and the air was sweetly scented
By an old-fashioned pig pen in the rear

Oh the sausages they are marked, if you touch them they will bark
It's a relic sent from "Bingen on the Rhine.”
All the borders have the croup caught from drinking frozen soup
At that all go hungry hash house where I dine

They have India rubber pickles, exercises ?????????
And a dinner bell and gong they can't afford
When they open up the gates, we'll come skippin' on roller skates
At that all go hungry hash house where I board

There's a woman called the Duchess, brings the coffee in on crutches
And the cake looks like a sponge that petrified
Oh the pies are old and gray; they were tackled by a jay
Who went right out and committed suicide

Oh the molasses are made of paint, if you smell them you will faint
They are yellow, and dished up in a gourd
Oh the eggs are made to match, if you touch them they will hatch
At that all go hungry hash house where I board.

HTML line breaks added. --JoeClone, 13-Mar-02.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Mickey191
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 12:46 AM

Les, I can't help you, but I sure like to know if it's available to buy.Great song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: masato sakurai
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 01:04 AM

Versions (audio) by Cofer Brothers and Uncle Dave Macon can be heard HERE.

~Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Charley Noble
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 07:49 AM

Refresh for further study!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: nutty
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 08:10 AM

Les ..... Apparently there are many versions/ recordings of thsi song as per info here

further info

and tune/lyrics here

Hungry Hash House

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: masato sakurai
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 09:06 AM

Thanks, nutty, fot the links. Interesting to know it's related to The Boarding-house (The Traditional Ballad Index).

~Masato

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: BanjoRay
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 10:23 AM

I think the first bunch of question marks should read "Copyright is on that turkey you could tell"

Cheers
Ray

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: BanjoRay
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 10:54 AM

A couple more things:

Sam McKee is of course Sam McGee.
It could be "Carve Me Right" not "Copyright" The second set of ????? could "Exercises done by cripples"
In the spoken intro, the 78 on the Hongking Duck site has a jump in it so that it should be "You can't tell me roasting ears ain't corn" - what you actually hear on the site is "You can't tell me roast..(click)tell me roasting ears ain't corn"

Cheers
Ray

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Francy
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 11:29 AM

The latest version I have on CD is on Norman Blake's 2001 recording entitled "Flower From The Fields Of Alabama". very nicely played on guitar by Norman and the vocals are straightforward and easy to copy down.....Shanachie 6053 Frank of Toledo

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 12:32 PM

You may not be aware of a very useful thread which is compiling Lyrics from Dave Macon songs. It started about a year back in response to a query of mine, but took on a life of its own. Mudcatter Stewie is responsible for most of the lyric additions (What a HERO!!!).
As yet Hungry Hash House has not appeared on the thread, but plenty of other sets of Uncle Dave's lyrics have.
Here is a link to the thread Uncle Dave Macon Lyrics
If you compile your set of lyrics for this song, please post them onto that thread so they can join their family!
If this thread doesn't clear up your request, try posting it onto the above link, and it may get a further response.
Quack!
Geoff the Duck!

Subject: Lyr Add: AT THE BOARDING HOUSE
From: Charley Noble
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 02:54 PM

Here's another boarding house ditty, short but sweet:

AT THE BOARDING HOUSE
(In The New Song Fest Deluxe Tune: "Silver Threads Among the Gold")


At the boarding house where I stayed,
Everything was growing old;
Silver hairs among the butter,
And the bread was all a-mold;
When the dog died, we had sausage,
When the cat died, catnip tea;
But when the landlord died, I left there,
Spareribs were too much for me!

Keep up the good work!
Landlady's Daughter, not to be confused with Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: GUEST,Pete Peterson
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 03:51 PM

Been singing those words for almost 35 years since I first learned them from Tom Paley, who I always thought had inherited the soul of Uncle Dave. I have my own interpretation of SOME of the words but some are still incomprehensible.
. . .skeleton, crossbones on the plate, AND THE WRITING ON THE TURKEY YOU CAN SPELL
We have India-rubber pickles, EXTRA SIZES COST TWO NICKELS
Paley's last chorus went:
And the flapjacks are like blankets, full of bugs and balls of hair
The sausages and bacon taste like Hell
The biscuits are li8ke lead, something's living in the bread
In that all go hungry hash house where I dwell.
also, "Ambeloneious cheese" I always heard has "man, bologna and cheese"-- I'm proud of figuring THAT one out.
of the many recordings of this, the first one I ever heard was Charlie Poole (or was it the New Lost City Ramblers covering Poole?) but I think I like Uncle Dave & the Cofer Brothers (sp?) best.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Les B
Date: 11 Mar 02 - 09:36 PM

Thanks all for the input. I was aware of the Charlie Poole version, but when I heard the Uncle Dave Macon, and Coffer Brothers version, on the "Old 78's" site referenced above, I liked their's better than Poole's.

I hear now that there is a skip in the record at the beginning and that explains the roasting ears duple.

The extra words from Tom Paley are very interesting. I still hear the one phrase as "Ambelonious cheese" and the others I am cogitating over.

By the way, I've run across the Ballad Index site (referenced above) before, and I find their dates to be much more recent than one would expect. For instance, Charlie Poole's recording of "All Go Hungry Hash House" is in the late 20's, and they say its relative "The Boarding House" (couldn't find the words at their site to make a definitive comparison?!?) was only recorded in the 1940's. Does anyone else feel they are a bit conservative in this respect ?

Subject: Lyr Add: THE BOARDING HOUSE
From: Dicho (Frank Staplin)
Date: 15 Mar 02 - 10:47 PM

The All-Go-Hungry Hash House (Boarding House) may go back to the 19th C. A version was collected in Arkansas that was said to have been learned in 1895.
The ambilonious cheese may originally have been "antediluvian." There are other differences; it will be easier to reproduce the entire song.

THE BOARDING HOUSE

There's a boarding house where I stay
That is turning my hair gray,
And the landlord is always full of beer.
The beds the bugs have rented
And the room is sweetly scented
By an old-fashioned tan-yard in the rear.

The doughnuts they are wooden,
We have cast-iron puddin',
We kneel and pray before we go to bed;
And if you would get a breeze
Of that antediluvian cheese,
You would think that someone hit you over the head.

We have India-rubber pickles,
Exercise them on bicycles, (bi-sick'-ells)
A dinner bell or gong we can't afford.
The minute they open the gates,
We rush in on roller skates,
At that all-go-hungry hash house where we board.

Our molasses are made of paint.
If you smell them you would faint.
They are green and dished out in a gourd.
The bread is full o' cracks.
You couldn't cut it with an axe,
At that all-go-hungry hash house where we board.

The big fat cook we call the duchess
Brings the coffee in on crutches.
The buckwheat cakes's like sponges petrified.
The pies are old and gray.
They were tackled by a jay
Who went right out and committed suicide.

The sausage it was marked.
If you'd touch it, it would bark.
The steak you couldn't cut it with a sword.
The eggs were brought to match.
If you'd shake them they would hatch,
At that all-go-hungry hash house where we board.

When we sit down to eat, we stutter.
There are whiskers in the butter.
The cheese comes from old Bingen on the Rhine.
All day yesterday we were tryin'
To get a skeleton for a sign
At that all-go-hungry Hash house where we board.

Sung by Laura Wasson, Elm Springs, Arkansas, 1942. "She learned it somewhere near Elm Springs, about 1895." The pronunciation "bi-SICK-ell" for bicycle was common from Oklahoma to Texas, Arkansas, and much of the border states area when I worked there in the 1950s.
Vance Randolph, Ozark Folksongs, ed. and abridged by Norm Cohen, 1982, Univ. Illinois Press, pp. 371-373.

Subject: Boarding House, Onion Hash
From: GUEST,AJ
Date: 26 Jul 03 - 11:23 PM

My Grandfather sang a song about a boarding-house, does this song sound familiar to anyone??


There is a boarding-house not far away, where they eat onion hash three times a day.

Oh!, how the boarders yell when they hear that dinner bell!

Oh!, how the onions smell three miles away!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: GUEST,Dale
Date: 27 Jul 03 - 12:32 AM

This is a side trip, but an interesting one, I think.

Going back to Dicho's post of 15 Mar 02, I was raised in Northern Illinois, spent most of my life in Southern Illinois, and have been in Arkansas for about 8 years now. No matter where I have been, bicycle has ALWAYS been uniformly pronounced as bi-sickle. Tricycle followed the same pattern.

Now a motorcycle was usually pronounced motor-sycle, though a few might call it a motor-sickle. If shortened to cycle, I remember it as being sickle more often than not. Unicycles followed the motorcycle rule, though we only saw them on TV or in the rare circus.

When bicycles that didn't go anywhere became popular, well, they were exer-sycles. Not much of a rule there.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Padre
Date: 27 Jul 03 - 09:49 AM

Guest AJ - The song you are thinking of sounds like "The Cookhouse" which was sung by Pete Seeger on an album called "Songs of the Spanish Civil War" put out by Folkways a long time ago.

The words, as I remember them, go:

There is a sweet cookhouse, not far away
Where we get sweet damn all
Three times a day
Eggs and ham we never see
Damn all sugar in our tea
And we are gradually
Fading away

The tune was "Old Soldiers Naver Die'

Padre

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: GUEST,Dawn
Date: 08 Dec 03 - 09:49 PM

Hello
This is in regards to your looking for words to all go hungry hash house

[1] "Touch Me Not" is on the teacups, skeleton cross bones on the plate,
And the writing on the turkey you can spell.
Oh, the biscuits they are named, and I'm going to have them framed
At that all go hungry hash house where I dwell.

[2] They have India rubber pickles, extra sizes cost two nickels,
And a dinner bell and gong they can't afford.
When they open up the gates, we'll come skipping on roller skates
At that all go hungry hash house where I board.

Another line from above I found was

They have India rubber pickles
Exercise them on bi-sick-ells

and the rest is the same

GOOD LUCK
DAWN

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: GUEST,silveranne
Date: 29 Jan 04 - 06:55 PM

I am looking for more on that song!
All I can remember is the chorus:

OH how the onions smell, when they hear that dinner bell!
OH how the onions smell, three miles away.

It's a joyful song and I sing it with gusto. My father sang it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Stewie
Date: 29 Jan 04 - 09:06 PM

Silveranne, the song you are looking for is 'Country Ham and Red Gravy'. I posted an attempted transcription of it HERE, but it had several inaccuracies. I have posted a corrected transcription to the Uncle Dave lyrics thread. You will find it as the most recent posting to that thread:

Uncle Dave lyrics thread.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: GUEST,Tony Edwards as sung by English (Eng-Bo) Jo
Date: 06 Sep 08 - 08:11 PM

There's a place far, far, away where I used to go and stay.
You could go there any time you wanted to board.
If you'd go and stay one day, you would want to get away,
And you'd never want to be seen there anymore.

The old lady they called "Dutchess" brings the coffee in on crutches,
And the cobwebs are swept up in a gourd.
The molasses mixed with paint, if you smell them you will faint,
At that all-go-hungry hash house where I board.

The beef-steak it was rare, and the butter had red hair,
And the coffee wasn't hot when it was poured.
The old eggs were put in a batch. If you touched them they would hatch
At that all-go-hungry hash house where I board.

Subject: Lyr Add: HUNGRY HASH HOUSE (from Charlie Poole)
From: bluerabbit10
Date: 06 Sep 08 - 09:53 PM

Here's a version I posted sometime ago on Country Tabs. Lyrics I took from the CD. The chords may not be right. I did it several years ago and would do it better today...

HUNGRY HASH HOUSE
Recorded by: Charlie Poole, New Lost City Ramblers
bluerabbit10 Valley Park, Mo

([D]) I'm a boarder and I ([D]) dwell in that second-rate ([D]) hotel.
([E7]) If I stay here long, I think I'll go ([A]) insane;
([D]) For I lay here on my ([G]) bunk and I cannot reach my ([G]) trunk
([A]) And the board would break a million- ([D]) aire.

([D]) Oh, they feed on chicken pie. If you eat it you will die.
([E7]) The meat you cannot cut it with a ([A]) sword.
([D]) Oh, there's undertakers hangin' ([G]) 'round, for there's good work to be ([G]) found
([A]) In that all-go-hungry hash house where I ([D]) board.

([D]) Oh, they carried me upstairs one night. You would need a fork and knife.
([E7]) It was something they had never done ([A]) before.
([D]) Oh, the fleas all held me ([G]) down while the cheesecake scrapped ([G]) around
([A]) In that all-go-hungry hash house where I ([D]) board.

([D]) Oh, the beefsteak it was rare and the butter had red hair,
([E7]) And the baby had its feet both in the ([A]) stew.
([D]) Oh, the eggs you dared not ([G]) touch. If you kicked one, it would ([G]) hatch.
([A]) In that all-go-hungry hash house where I ([D]) dine.

([D]) Well, she promised she would meet me when the clock struck seventeen
([E7]) At the stock-yards just five miles outside of ([A]) town;
([D]) Where there's pig's feet and pig's ([G]) ears, and tough old Texas ([G]) steers
([A]) Sell for sirloin steak at nineteen cents a ([D]) pound.

([D]) She's my darling. She's my daisy. She's hump-backed and she's crazy.
([E7]) She's knock-kneed, she's bow-legged and she's ([A]) lame.
([D]) And though they say her breath is ([G]) sweet, I would rather smell her ([G]) feet.
([A]) She' my freckle-faced consumptive Mary ([D]) Jane.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: pdq
Date: 06 Sep 08 - 10:06 PM

This song is also on Norman Blake's "Flower From The Fields Of Alabama" CD, Shanachie 6053. This is as close to "folk" as Narman Blake has ever been. Amazing sense of timing and solid guitar work, but no attempt to do the pyrotechnics of "Blackberry Blossom" and a couple of his other records in the mid to late 1970s.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Stewie
Date: 07 Sep 08 - 07:58 PM

I have added a transcription of Uncle Dave's recording of 'All Go Hungry Hash House' to the Uncle Dave Macon lyrics thread. It differs in various places from the transcription given by Les B. at the top of this thread.

Uncle Dave lyrics thread

I am unable to find any evidence to support Les B's claim that Uncle Dave recorded the song with the Fruit Jar Drinkers. His 1925 recording, the first audio recording of the song, was a solo effort. As far as I can tell from a quick troll through the discographies, Uncle Dave recorded it again on 23 December 1939 with his son Doris at the Grand Ole Opry, but this remained unissued until the recent Bear Family Box set of Uncle Dave's recordings. The only other occasion that he recorded the song was in the Spring of 1950 at his home in Kittrell, Tennessee, but this again was a solo effort. It was issued on a Davis Unlimited LP and reissued in the Bear Family box set.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House - Dave Macon
From: Joe_F
Date: 07 Sep 08 - 08:27 PM

I am charmed by the evident existence of a dialect in which "molasses" is plural.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 30 Sep 08 - 11:35 AM

I am convinced this is what Uncle Dave Macon sings:

"Copyrighted" on that turkey you could spell.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Mark Ross
Date: 30 Sep 08 - 12:15 PM

Glenn Ohrlin had a version of this that I am trying to recall. Anybody have the lyrics? If not I can track Glenn down and ask him.

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: GUEST,John Earle
Date: 09 Mar 09 - 03:37 AM

My greataunt, a prim Victorian lady from upstate New York, taught me a song in the late 1940s that she remembered from her youth:

I know a boarding house, far, far away.
Where they serve ham and eggs three times a day.
Oh how the boarders yell when they hear that dinner bell
Oh what an awful smell three times a day.

It would appear to have been a popular folk song with many variants over 100 years ago when boarding houses were omnipresent.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Joe_F
Date: 09 Mar 09 - 08:55 PM

John Earle: That must be TTTO "Old Soldiers Never Die". That song has been extensively parodied, especially since it was quoted by Gen. MacArthur in his speech to Congress.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: open mike
Date: 09 Mar 09 - 09:31 PM

i was reminded of another Dave...Dave Von Ronk,
but that was another dish..one meat ball..

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Mar 09 - 12:11 AM

Ray Wood (Houston, TX) sings "I know a boarding house," The John and Ruby Lomax 1939 Southern States Recording Trip. Same old tune.
The melody is the old hymn, "There is a happy land."

Mrs. Clancy's Boarding House, and Flanigan's Boarding House, were vaudeville songs popular about 1908, but I haven't heard them.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 Mar 09 - 12:22 AM

According to the Cyberhymnal, the tune to "There is a Happy Land" was arranged in 1850 by Leonard P. Breedlove, based on a Hindustani air.

This air has not been identified, Breedlove may have said that because he didn't know the origin, or he composed it himself. The words to the hymn are by Andrew Young, 1838.
(I think all this is in another thread but I don't feel like searching).

Happy Land

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 10 Mar 09 - 01:06 AM

As a kid we'd sing:

There is a happy land far, far away,
Where we get bread and jam three times a day.

Seamus

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Apr 10 - 10:41 AM

There's a part in the book "By the Shores of Silver Lake" that is on of the "Little House on the Prairie" series where the family travels to a city. When they get off the train they pass a man singing a song to the tune of one Ma's favorite hymns, "There is a Happy Land."

But instead of the familiar words of the hymn, the man is singing:

There is a boarding house
Not far away
Where they have steak and eggs
Three times a day

Boy, how those boarders yell
When they hear that dinner bell
Wow, how those egss do smell
Three times a day!

Ma looks so displeased at the man singing a song, in front of her & her daughters no less, that the man stops singing until they pass.

I have to admit, I laughed but I know Ma wouldn't have approved.

= )

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Apr 10 - 01:15 AM

Now we have thread-drifted on to songs to tune of There·Is·A·Happy·Land, I recall that the late Robin Hall, when he first came to London in 1956 with his stock of Glasgow children's street ballads {e.g. Ye Cannae Shove Your Granny Off A Bus}, used to sing one that went

There is a happy land
Down in Duke Street Jail
Where all the convicts stand
With their mops and pails
Ham and eggs you'll never see
Dirty water to your tea
Here we live in misery
Down in Duke Street Jail

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: GUEST,Patty
Date: 30 Nov 12 - 06:58 PM

We had a professor in graduate school who used to sing a song that went something like:
There is a boarding house
Far far away
Where they serve sausages
Three times a day
You can hear the the boarders shout
When they bring the sausages out
Hoootla haya hootla hout
Three time a day

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: pdq
Date: 30 Nov 12 - 08:56 PM

The Binkley Brothers recorded this song in 1928 in Nashville.

The were very popular at the Grand 'Ole Opry until they quit music in 1938.

There are only six songs they recorded that survived to present times.

"Give Me Back My 15 Cents" is another.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: All Go Hungry Hash House (Dave Macon)
From: GUEST,Dick Huey, Dubois, Pennsylvania.
Date: 01 Dec 14 - 06:24 PM

This is how I remember my Dad doing this song. I hope it helps.


Oh that boarding where I stay, it is turning my hair gray
the landlord is always full of beer
and the beds and the bugs are rented, by a room sweetly sented
By an old-fashioned pig pen in the rear
They have indian rubber pickles exercises on bicycles a dinner bell a gone you can't afford when the open up the gates they ride in on roller skates at that ole go hungry hash house where I board

Now the old fat cook calld Dutches beings the coffe in on crutches the buck wheat cake like spunges petrified the pies were old and gray the were tackled by a jay who went right out and commited sucide the eggs were boiled to match and if you touched them they would hatch the biskets were as hollow as a gord the pie were old and gray they were tackled by a jay who went right out and comitted sucide

Now we all sat down to supper and there were wiskers on the butter the the chees was at the beginning of the rine the sausages were fat marked, if you touch them it would bark and the prunes were dated 1849 the molasses was made of paint, if you smell it you will faint and the beef stake couldn't with any sword and yesterday was the time to trade a skeleton for a sign at that old go hungry hash house where I board.