Dirty lyrics Ella Fitzgerald album?

December 22, 2011 4:30 PM

I'm trying to find an album by (I think) Ella Fitzgerald with suggestive/dirty lyrics. If my memory is correct, it was a full album and the lyrics were at minimum very suggestive and more toward full-on profane.
posted by letitrain to Media & Arts (17 answers total)

Just one artist? Copulatin' Blues has songs by several artists.
posted by megatherium at 4:58 PM on December 22, 2011

Perhaps Blue Lu Barker? She was a contemporary of Ella's and was famous for working, well, blue.
posted by sourwookie at 5:00 PM on December 22, 2011

Lucille Bogan [audio nsfw] is another that comes to mind ... oh, I guess she's on the Copulatin' Blues compilation. I can't recall Ella Fitzgerald doing anything that went beyond slightly suggestive.
posted by Lorin at 5:11 PM on December 22, 2011

Not only do I not recall Ella doing anything beyond slightly suggestive, I can't imagine it. She was a classy lady.
posted by cardioid at 5:19 PM on December 22, 2011

Response by poster: Ha ha, I'm dying listening to Lucille Bogan - that's quite a bit more profane than I recall. The music I'm looking for sounded a lot like Ella singing (so not Blue Lu Barker).
posted by letitrain at 5:36 PM on December 22, 2011

Response by poster: Maybe Ethel Waters? I found this video while looking up Copulatin' Blues. The sound isn't quite right (sounds earlier), but the innuendo is.
posted by letitrain at 5:40 PM on December 22, 2011

You may be thinking of Dinah Washington, "Long Sliding Thing"
posted by hortense at 5:49 PM on December 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: hortense, that might not be the exact tune, but it is exactly the kind of music I remember. Thanks!
posted by letitrain at 5:58 PM on December 22, 2011

I'm on my phone and links are awkward, but please search YouTube for Bessie Smith singing Kitchen Man.
posted by Lou Stuells at 7:29 PM on December 22, 2011

Julia Lee also made some sweetly saucy songs full of double entendres, and she sounds a bit like Ella. Here's "Snatch and Grab It" and "I Didn't Like It the First Time."
posted by vickyverky at 7:32 PM on December 22, 2011

Also, Julia Lee's album "Of Lions and Lambs" is almost all dirty stuff.
posted by vickyverky at 7:35 PM on December 22, 2011 [1 favorite]

Nina Simone?
posted by Runes at 10:20 PM on December 22, 2011

Millie Jackson is certainly profane, but I don't think she would be mistaken for Ella Fitzgerald.
posted by MrMoonPie at 10:32 PM on December 22, 2011

The risque Miss Ella wasn't "dirty" as in sexual, but was about drug use. She was, after all, a jazz musician ;)

When I Get Low I Get High and Wacky Dust (SLYT potentially NSFW depicting what may or may not be illegal drugs). The Wikipedia article for Wacky Dust is brief but has details of who wrote the song.

I'd love it if she recorded sexy songs ... but somehow I doubt it. :(
posted by kuppajava at 9:12 AM on December 23, 2011

There's a handful of compilations with these; notably He Got Out His Big Ten Inch: A Cornucopia of Risque R&B, Rude Blues and Double-Entendre Doo-Wop [grooveshark link]
posted by fizzix at 1:19 PM on December 23, 2011 [1 favorite]

That Dinah Washington tune is on a great Rhino comp called Risque Rhythm: Nasty 50s R&B. Check "Walkin Blues," "Long John Blues" and "My Man Stands Out" for similar nasty female vocal stuff.
posted by mediareport at 4:54 PM on December 23, 2011 [1 favorite]

Probably not what you're looking for, but do you know the Ruth Brown song "If I Can't Sell It, I'll Sit On It (I Ain't Gonna Give It Away)"? One of my mom's favorite songs…
posted by Lexica at 11:00 PM on December 23, 2011