Topic: Most Sexist and or Misoginistic Blues Lyrics

[Coyote Slim]

Big Bill "When I Been Drinkin'"

I'm lookin' for a woman that ain't never been kissed
Maybe we can get along an' I won't have to use my fist

I don't think that song is about beating his woman.  I think it's about beating himself.    In fact, I've always wondered if the real lyrics were "I'm lookin' for a woman knows just how I like to be kissed, etc."  Makes more sense to me, anyway. 

[Mr.OMuck]

HEEYAWK!

[dingwall]

Relevant verses (blood and wine)

Kokomo Arnold   SLOP JAR BLUES
Now, I could cut your throat, mama, and drink your blood like wine.
Says I could cut your throat, mama, and drink your blood like wine.
'Cause you's a old dirty buzzard and you sure done lost your mind.

Monette Moore   TREATED WRONG BLUES
I'm gonna cut your throat, babe, drink your blood like wine.
I'm gonna cut your throat, babe, drink your blood like wine.
I'll let these women know that you're a man of mine.

Monette Moore   BULLET WOUND BLUES
When he cries out loud that he is dyin',
When he cries out loud that he is dyin',
I'll pierce his heart and drink his blood like wine.

[Mr.OMuck]

Perhaps we need to start a new Vampirism thread?

[unezrider]

hello friend,
the one that i found most startling (& i'm sure this has everything to do w/ it being the 1st example of this sort of thing i ever came across in a song) was robert johnson singing, "i'm going to beat my woman, till i get satisfied." & initially i too, had some trouble w/ 'southern can is mine', but have grown to love it over the years. a good song's, a good song.
funny how some forms of violence in song mean nothing to us, & others make an uncomfortable impression.
& to show i'm not completely desensitized by those haunting country blues images - i recently got into wynonie harris (not country blues, i know) & again, i was caught off guard when he sang in his song, 'bloodshot eyes' - "go find the guy who beat you up & ask him to take you back." great tune & performance, by the way.
chris

[Mike Brosnan]

Big Bill "When I Been Drinkin'"

I'm lookin' for a woman that ain't never been kissed
Maybe we can get along an' I won't have to use my fist

I don't think that song is about beating his woman.  I think it's about beating himself.    In fact, I've always wondered if the real lyrics were "I'm lookin' for a woman knows just how I like to be kissed, etc."  Makes more sense to me, anyway. 

 

Well, that's certainly a... ahh... more pleasant way of thinking about it.  Definitely never even occurred to me.  I somehow doubt that's what Broonzy was referring to, but... Who knows?

I'm with Andrew about casual misogyny bothering me more than the over the top stuff.  A to Z almost seems like a mockery of itself (it still makes me sick though).  But John Hurt playfully singing "One o' these mornin's gonna wake up crazy, gonna grab my gun, gonna kill my baby"...  That just doesn't sit right with me.  (I always sing "Gonna pack my bag, gonna leave my baby").

There are all kinds of blues lyrics that I'm not okay with singing.  Violent and otherwise. 

But I remember being a terrified little boy listening to my stepfather beating my mother....

So some lyrics are absolutely out of the question.

[Coyote Slim]

"If you whup her when she need it, the judge will not let you explain." -- Sonnyboy Williamson/ Rice Miller from "A Woman is the Glory of a Man."

I've never really understood what he was trying to tell us about in this song.


Then there's that line from "Ain't Nobody's Business":
"If someday I go crazy
buy me a shotgun
shoot my baby, etc"

I always sing "load up my shotgun" (already having the firearm in my closet...never fired it myself though, it was my grandpa's) and then before the chorus interject "Somebody better stop me because I don't wanna go to jail.