Michigan Water

I remember the first time I went sneaking off and met Buddy Bolden

I must've been about 13 at the time
And it was just past near dark, see
And, well, I was out walking where good Creoles just did not go
When I heard this soulfully, woefully low-down sound

All that uptown ragtime tagalong
How many y'all has ever loved yourselves a brown-skinned gal?
Ooh-wee! When they're sweet
You get to understand why God made the earth like He did
All rich and dark
Just make you wanna plow all night long!

All that uptown ragtime tagalong
Them Creoles may know the right way to hold a fork
But the good folk ain't nothin' compared to a good
All that uptown ragtime tagalong
Barrelhouse blues

Michigan water
Tastes like sherry wine
Mean, mean, mean sherry wine
Michigan water
It tastes like sherry wine
I love that stuff, mm
And Mississippi water tastes like turpentine
Stay away from that stuff!

Grandpa's sweet gal, she got a black cat bone
Oh, Grandpa's sweet gal, she, she got a black cat bone
You know that that ho get a who-do
Now I can't leave her alone

Well, now
What has we got here?
Say, Frenchie
Your mama know you hangin' with us dark town folk?

My name's not Frenchie
It's Fredinand Lamothe Morton
You look like you got music in you
You know Lonesome Bed Blues?
Country Street Blues?
I know the Miserere from Il Trovatore
That ain't no music!
The notes is written out, tellin' you what's gonna come next
That's like waking up in the morning
Knowing you gonna be alive at the end of the day
Three-fingered Jake!
Show 'im that walk you do called Shootin the Hatchet!

Too-tight Nora! Too-tight Nora! Baby!
Strut that strut
The one that get the sun so hot
It gotta go home for the night to cool off

Now, when you're playing what they walkin'
That's music
Boys, we 'bout to tear that piano
I'm gonna wear ostrich plumes and satin
Or horsehair wigs three feet high
Or all you gumbo-eating bitches
Can kiss my ass goodbye

Mississippi water ain't no piece of pie
They say Michigan water tastes like sherry wine
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Mississippi water tastes like
Tastes like
It tastes like turpentine

And it was around about now
That I invented jazz
And it came to pass
That a messenger was called who came to believe
That the message was him
For, you see
What Jelly left out of his revisionist reverie is la verite
That's French for the boy be tellin' lies
After his mama was no more
Jelly and his sisters were raised by Grand-Mimi
N'est-ce pas, Jelly?
This never happened
And once she found out about you jammin' with them n*ggers
And missing with them whores-