"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" lyrics
"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown"
Woah!
Well, the South side of Chicago
Is the baddest part of town
And if you go down there
You better just beware
Of a man named Leroy Brown
Now Leroy more than trouble
You see he stand 'bout six foot four
All the downtown ladies call him "Treetop Lover"
All the men just call him "Sir"
And it's bad, bad Leroy Brown
The baddest man in the whole damned town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Now Leroy he's a gambler
And he likes his fancy clothes
And he likes to wave his diamond rings
In front of everybody's nose
He got a custom Continental
He got an Eldorado too
He got a 32 gun in his pocket for fun
He got a razor in his shoe
And it's bad, bad Leroy Brown
The baddest man in the whole damned town
Badder than old King Kong
Meaner than a junkyard dog
Now Friday bout a week ago
Leroy shootin' dice
And at the edge of the bar
Sat a girl named Doris
And ooh that girl looked nice
Well he cast his eyes upon her
And the trouble soon began
Cause Leroy Brown, he learned a lesson
'Bout messin' with the wife of a jealous man
And it's bad, bad Leroy Brown
The baddest man in the whole damned town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Well the two men took to fightin'
And when they pulled them from the floor
Leroy looked like a jigsaw puzzle
With a couple of pieces gone
And it's bad, bad Leroy Brown
The baddest man in the whole damn town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
And it's bad, bad Leroy Brown
The baddest man in the whole damned town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Yeah, badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Thanks to Isaac David Fraker for correcting these lyrics.
Writer(s): Jim Croce
Jim Croce said two people inspired this song: a sergeant at Fort Jackson and a private at Fort Dix. The actual Leroy Brown was the sergeant. In Croce's words: "He stayed there about a week, and one evening he turned around and said he was really fed up and tired. He went AWOL, and then came back at the end of the month to get his paycheck. They put handcuffs on him and took him away. Just to listen to him talk and see how 'bad' he was, I knew someday I was gonna write a song about him."
'Junkyard gods' reference was explained by Jim Croce when he said, "They all have either an axle tied around their necks or an old lawnmower to keep 'em at least slowed down a bit, so you have a decent chance of getting away from them."
Bad, Bad Leroy Brown was the first number-one hit for Jim Croce in 1973.
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album:
"Life And Times" (1973)