![]() If you’re gonna do it that way I mean, you know you shouldn’t do it that way…”Īnd so, I was dreaming again that I was rowing past the first floor of the Saenger Theatre in New Orleans, beating oars She said now “I’m accommodating to a lot of different stuntsīut only on my back boy, and not on my front… ![]() His wife took a knife, said “I’ll take your life Pig Bodine, he came out of the Navy, full of tall tales of the sea That’s the way to do it, if you’re gonna do it Still, she must have loved fashion, the way she looked girls up and downĪll I ever seen her give a man was a frown ![]() In a three-piece suit and a battered chapeau Still, she sure looked sweet from her head to her feet Sweet Miss Daisy was an awful nice lady, but she never had a beau… no romance Well, that ain’t the way to do it, you know you shouldn’t do it, Now she’s so bow-legged she can’t make ends meet So, Willie put his sister out on the street The preacher, the teacher, even less savoury creatures, We all wondered what he’s doing round here Well, Willie the weasel, he came from Chicago Well you can shuffle and squawk, you can talk, talk, talk That ain’t the way to do it, you know you shouldn’t do it, In what are basically three minute popular songs about screwing and drinking, then I guess you could ask me?Įither that or write it on a postcard and send it to Istanbul, I’ve heard that it’s lovely this time of year. Having said that I've also developed, as we've played more family friendly events,Ī whole panoply of substitute lyrics for venues and audiences that are more faint of heart - the ones below being the unexpurgated versions.Īnyway, hope you enjoy reading these, and if there’s any reference that puzzles- because there is an awful lot of high-falutin’ literary stuff I’ve tried to hide, Foul language and prurience really has nothing to do with a lack of human decency, or a respect of sexual equality- well, that’s what I’ve always firmly f**king believed, ladies and gents and anyone else who cares to listen. ![]() If there is any offense to be taken, it’s in the outlook of a few of the protagonists I’ve created- a clue: if I’m singing a song which has a dwarf in it and I use the word ‘midget’- a non-scientific, offensive slang term, then that’s a hint the narrator in the song is going to be a jerk! A lot of my protagonists are dubious individuals- there are pimps, charlatans and hucksters galore, but a lot of nice guys who just love to swear, too. I’ve also fought hard when adapting those original songs to honour the level of depravity that was present in a lot of songs at the time - I hate the white-washing of the past, the idea that it was a world of white picket fences and homogenous family-friendliness, and hope I’ve managed to walk the line between celebrating ribaldry and excising any of the morally offensive gubbins that can lurk in the corners of some vintage material. When they have remained largely or wholly the same in just the chorus, then I’ve always tried to bring a fresh perspective to the song in the verses. Of course, the ones I’ve not changed at all, I’ve not transcribed here. Most of them are completely original, a few have kept some lyrics from the original numbers – as nearly all our songs are adaptations of material from the 1920s and 1930s, and some have melodies so famous that changing the chorus would jar on the ear. These are all the ones for the Devil’s Jukebox. Whether this just comes randomly, or I’m making myself do it in a room full of musicians hungry for some kind of structure.Ĭonsequently, I’ve written a lot of song lyrics down the years.Ī great pile I’ve had to spend some hours rewriting, tweaking- once I’ve started singing and the true testing begins. $('a.logout-a').The words pouring out of me at an alarming rate.
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