Dead Songs in Depth

    
Turn On Your Love Light
w&m: Malone
LASF: http://www.whitegum.com/songfile/TURNONYR.HTM
  

    



Jon Slater writes:



At the end of the song, when Pigpen says, "....she's got _______ _________
_________, ?great big enormous thighs, working...."

what is he actually saying??

Thanks.

Jon
  

    


That's a question that has been discussed many times in many venues.  I was
never satisfied with the answers until Eric Thompson played me a tape he made
of Ron McKernan from the very early '60s, singing that verse in a much slower
song.

The words are:

She got box back knitties
Great big noble thighs
Workin' undercover
With a boar hog eye




What does it mean?  Good question!
  

    
Some speculation on the meaning of various parts of this ad lib stuff from
Pigpen are included in the forthcoming print version of the Complete
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics. I'll dig the stuff out and post it here,
probably tomorrow.
  

    
Cool!
  

    
From the notes to Love Light:
Texas songster Mance Lipscomb's tune "Shke Shake, Mama" contains the
following verse:

Oh I like my babe but I don't like her teddy bear (2x)
I'm gon' buy her a box-back nittie to wear

Mack McCormick's 1960 liner notes to Lipscomb's original Arhoolie LP
discusses "one verse lauding the 'box-back nittie' which replaced the 'teddy
bear' garment which men found unappealing." Thus "nittie" could refer to a
knitted garment, or to a nightie. One theory has it that box-back nitties
are long flannel underwear with a flap in the back.

And for boar-hog's eye:

Compare Texas Alexander's "Bo' Hog Blues":

She got little bitty legs, gee, but below her thighs (2x)
She got something on-a-yonder works like a bo' hog's eye

So. Nothing here that much explains anything, but food for thought. Should
you care to think on these matters.
  

    
something tells me a boar hog's eye is probably some kind of magic
talisman or mojo object, but i can't say what it is that tells me that.
  

    
Good speculation! Let me do some more looking around in obscure reference
books...
  

    
then, for gender equity, we have:

Jap's eye n. Male urethral opening; hogs eye (qv).

(from the Profanisaurus
<http://www.milkinfirst.com/dictionary/j.htm#Jap's%20eye>)
  

    
From the excellent biography of Jelly Roll Morton, Jelly's Blues, by
Howard Reich and William Gaines (Da Capo, 2003):

"Unfortunately, Lila instantly realized that the blade had merely
ripped the loose, boxed-back suit Mills was wearing, not the flesh she
had intended to rip. 'The coat was split from end to end but the knife
didn't cut Billy because of the box back coat,' Morton later
explained." p 32
  

    
The recent and wonderful multimedia investigation of Geeshie Wiley and
Elvie Thomas by John Jeremiah Sullivan cites a close relative of Texas
Alexander's tune, Geeshie and Elvie's Skinny Leg Blues:

I got little bitty legs, keep up these noble thighs, 
I got little bitty legs, keep up these noble thighs, 
Aah, keep up these noble thighs. 
I got something underneath, and it works like a boar hog’s eye.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/04/13/magazine/blues.html?_r=0
  

    
That article, btw, is fabulous.  Well worth your time.
  

    
Read it this morning. Really great piece.
  

    
noticed that lyric too