With the recent death of song writer Jerry Lieber, he was quoted as saying he never liked Elvis’ ad-libbed line “you ain’t never caught a rabbit, and you ain’t no friend of mine”. Does anyone know how this line was supposed to read?
Also, what’s this about this song being written for a female singer of the time? How did it come to Elvis?
Elvis-schmelvis. Big Mama was the RILL thing.
Number 1 on the R&B charts for Big Mama Thornton in 1952. It was covered a shitload of times before Elvis got hold of it, and who knows when the changed lyrics came in.
The original lyric was:
You ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog, snoopin’ ‘round my door
You ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog, snoopin’ 'round my door
You can wag your tail but I ain’t gonna feed you no more.
Possibly considered a bit suggestive for the pop market at the time.
It was suggestive in a way that doesn’t translate from female to male singer. That’s why in Big Mama Thornton’s the “hound dog” is a man looking to get some, and in Elvis’ version it’s… well it’s a hound dog.
According to both Dave Marsh’s “The Heart of Rock and Soul: The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever Made” and Wikipedia, the “you ain’t never caught a rabbit line” was introduced in a cover of “Hound Dog” by Freddie Bell and the Bell Boys. Elvis heard that version in Las Vegas in the spring of 1956 when Presley was playing at the New Frontier Hotel and Bell & co were a featured act at the Sands.