Topic: 'Cause I was born in the country...

[maddoggirl]

Heya, chaps. I've been listening to Richard 'Rabbit' Brown's sublime 'James Alley Blues' a lot recently and I suddenly realised that there's one verse that I've definitely heard somewhere else, although I can't find the blues I'm thinking of anyplace. The verse I've heard elsewhere goes:


'Cause I was born in the country, she thinks that I'm easy to rule,
'Cause I was born in the country, she thinks that I'm easy to rule,
She try to hitch me to a wagon, want to drive me like a mule.


I know I've heard this elsewhere! Not that exact phrasing - I think it was 'drive me for a mule' and the tone might have been more in the sense of asking the woman in question to do it, rather than complaining about it. The singer I think had a soft, highish sort of voice, a little like McTell or Frank Stokes.

I know similar lines crop up in BLJ's 'Rabbit Foot Blues' and in Casey Bill Wheldon's 'Hitch Me To Your Buggy', but it isn't either of those, I'm certain. Help!

[uncle bud]

Was it prewar? I swear I can hear Joe Callicott singing this verse but can't remember where at the moment.

[maddoggirl]

I'm pretty sure it was pre-war because it had that sort of far-away sound you get on old records. I remember having to concentrate a little to make out the words.

[uncle bud]

Jim Jackson, My Monday Woman Blues (Takes 1, 3) is a candidate:

I'm just from the country and you know I'm easy to rule
You can hitch me to your cart, girl, and drive me for your mule

Though the sound on that one is quite clear.

[maddoggirl]

I don't know how you find this stuff! Although I don't think this is where I heard it, that's the right lyrics with the emphasis on wanting to be driven for a mule rather than avoiding it. Cool song, though, not one I'd heard before