Topic: Brand and product names in country blues

[Rivers]

Booger Rooger Blues, Blind Lemon Jefferson, 1926, Some joker learned my baby how to shift gear on a Cadillac 8 // Sugar, every since that happened, I can't keep my business straight

Stealing To Her Man, Texas Alexander, Says, I b'lieve I'll get just like Mister Henry Ford // Gonna have me a woman runnin' on every road

[dj]

We have another Rolls Royce.

Willie Baker, "Sweet Patunia Blues", 1929: "I got a gal, she got a Rolls Royce, she didn't get it all by using her voice / I'm wild about my 'Tuni, only thing I crave..."

[dj]

...And we've got Rolls Royal (and Packard, Ford and "Studs" (Stutz?)).  Credit must go to Michael Taft via Mr. Google for this one.

Cleo Gibson, "I've Got Ford Movements In My Hips", 1929: 

"I've got Ford engine movements in my hips, ten thousand miles guarantee
A Ford is a car everybody wants to ride, jump in you will see
You can all have the Rolls Royal, your Packard and Studs
Take a Ford engine boys, to do your stuff"

[dj]

Automobiles: Cadillac

Jack Kelly And His South Memphis Jug Band: "Cadillac Baby", 1933 "Now somebody learned my baby I didn't get here on a Cadillac 8"

[Bunker Hill]

Cleo Gibson, "I've Got Ford Movements In My Hips", 1929: 

"I've got Ford engine movements in my hips, ten thousand miles guarantee
A Ford is a car everybody wants to ride, jump in you will see
You can all have the Rolls Royal, your Packard and Studs
Take a Ford engine boys, to do your stuff"

DJ many thanks for mentioning this fantastic song which was on the very first compilation of "classic" female blues singers I ever bought. The LP has just been unearthed (Jazz Sounds Of The 20s - Parlophone PMC1177) and the song given a spin...super.

Let normal service continue.

[dj]

Rivers, sorry for taking this thread off topic for a post or two, but...

Parlophone put out an LP of "Jazz" that included Cleo Gibson?  Wow.  Times were different back then.

[Bunker Hill]

Rivers, sorry for taking this thread off topic for a post or two, but...

Parlophone put out an LP of "Jazz" that included Cleo Gibson?  Wow.  Times were different back then.

The clue lies in the sub title "blues singers and accompanists"; most featuring Armstrong, or Kid Ory or Joe Oliver. I attempted a scan of the track list, personnel and Brian Rust's notes (1962) but too faded for my ancient OCR software to cope with. Others featured are Sippie Wallace, Victoria Spivey, Chippie Hill, Butterbeans & Susie, Mamie Smith, Sara Martin and Margaret Johnson. As I said my introduction to others than Bessie Smith or Ma Rainey who at the time were the only ones I had LPs.

[Rivers]

Not OT at all, and many thanks for clearing up the "Rolls Royal" thing.

[dj]

Automobiles:  Packard, Cadillac

Sonny Boy Williamson, "Low Down Blues", 1938: "Well now I was going to buy you a Packard baby, I was going to buy you a Packard too / I was going to buy you a Cadillac you know just to try to get along with you"

I swear that Sonny Boy sings Packard twice, almost certainly that's a mistake either in Sonny Boy's singing or in my hearing.  If anyone has an alternate understanding of what's being sung, I'd like to hear it. 

[waxwing]

Did he buy her other things in previous verses? He could have left out the "too" from the first line where he inserted "baby" instead. Make sense?

All for now.
John C.

[Johnm]

Hi all,
Pigmeat Pete and Catjuice Charlie's "Do It Right" has a verse that rhymes Coca-Cola and Victrola.
all best,
Johnm

[SCWV]

Not the only artist to sing about Coca Cola, ... ,

Emry Arthur, who had one of the first versions (or the first version) of "Man of Constant Sorrow, sang about "I'm going to Pensacola to get drunk on Coca Cola" in his version of "Nobody's Business" (recorded 1928).

Pepsi Cola would've been better.

[SCWV]

Not the only artist to sing about Coca Cola, ... ,

Emry Arthur, who had one of the first versions (or the first version) of "Man of Constant Sorrow, sang about "I'm going to Pensacola to get drunk on Coca Cola" in his version of "Nobody's Business" (recorded 1928).

Pepsi Cola would've been better.

Speaking of soft drinks:  I believe that Bascom Lamar Lunsford's Good Ol' Mountain Dew was used to promote the soft drink, & I've Got an Ice Cold Nu Grape by the Nu-Grape Twins was a pre-fabricated jingle for a product intentionally done in Country Blues style.

[frankie]

Another plug for Gulf gas in Charlie McCoy's "Your Valves Need Grinding:"

Screw up on your carburetor, tighten down on your coil
Use this good Gulf gas and the best of oil

[oddenda]

Folks -

          I can't believe it! Firstly, though, is Frank Edwards' "Terraplane Blues" which has nothing whatsoever to do with R. Johnson's song IN SPITE OF WHAT HAS BEEN WRITTEN!

          The biggie is Buddy Moss' "Ride to Your Funeral in a V-8 Ford"... because he DID just that after killing his girlfriend in 1935. Life imitating art as his recording preceded his homicide. I am surprised that y'all haven't mentioned that, but the SE tends to get lost in the sauce.

Peter B.