# What is this lyric? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** music\ **Created:** [April 14, 2022, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841 "2022-04-14T21:50:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/1 "2022-04-14T21:50:36Z")
This is a cover of an old song by Furry Lewis. No relation to the Grateful Dead’s “Casey Jones.” Around 4:50, he sings “I’m a natural born (something), I don’t have to work.” “Easer”? “Easel”? What say you? [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/_4wdxC0wlwU/maxresdefault.jpg "Casey Jones (On the Road Again)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4wdxC0wlwU) ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/2 "2022-04-14T21:55:54Z")
I found [some lyrics](https://www.google.com/search?q=casey+jones+lyrics+furry+lewis&oq=casey+jones+lyrics+furry+lewis&aqs=chrome..69i57.17897j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8) and it looks like “Eastman.” ---
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/3 "2022-04-14T21:56:25Z")
I saw that too, and can’t imagine what that would mean. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/4 "2022-04-14T21:59:42Z")
Google says: Someone who manages or has significant financial interest in an industrial enterprise. Artificer, discoverer, inventor. Clear things up for you? Me, neither. 😄 ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2022, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/5 "2022-04-14T22:02:06Z")
This discussion agrees it is Eastman, but can only conjecture about what it means: > The speaker also declares himself a “natural born Eastman” a number of times (one assumes that Lewis means that the speaker - like himself - was born in the eastern United States. Although why this should mean that he “don’t have to work” is unclear), which has no clear connection to the story of Casey Jones. > **["Kassie Jones" - Furry Lewis](http://theanthologyofamericanfolkmusic.blogspot.com/2010/01/kassie-jones-furry-lewis.html?m=1)** > > Set One: Ballads; Disc Two; Track Ten: "Kassie Jones" performed by Furry Lewis. "Vocal solo with guitar." Recorded in Memphis on August 28, ... ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/6 "2022-04-15T05:10:46Z")
> [@jaycat](#): > > I saw that too, and can’t imagine what that would mean. Linda Eastman didn’t have to work much after she married Paul McCartney… ---
**Author:** ![Hatchie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hatchie/32/3983_2.png) [@Hatchie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hatchie)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/7 "2022-04-15T06:03:26Z")
I’ve heard different versions of that “don’t have to work” line, seems to have been repurposed as a sort of boast or pick-up line in different songs, where a gal asks the singer his name and he sings “I told her my name was on the tail of my shirt/ I’m a rockin’ chair daddy, don’t have to work”. Quick lookup finds a Nick Tosches piece where he finds variations on records by Jimmie Rodgers, Jimmie Davis, Harmonica Frank Floyd and Gene Autry (who doesn’t have to work because he’s a “do-right daddy”). Furry Lewis indeed sings “eastman” according to Nick but neglects to tell us what that is. But the line was used in a song collected by a folklorist twenty years before Lewis recorded it. One of those inventions that got passed around. That’s all I got. ---
**Author:** ![Hatchie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hatchie/32/3983_2.png) [@Hatchie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hatchie)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/8 "2022-04-15T06:27:31Z")
I found one online source that defines both “easeman” and “eastman” as a “kept man, one who lives on money earned by a woman; a pimp …1910s US Black sl.” ---
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/9 "2022-04-15T12:34:15Z")
Thanks for all the info, guys. I wonder, though, why someone might have their name on the tail of their shirt. Going away to summer camp? ---
**Author:** ![Hatchie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hatchie/32/3983_2.png) [@Hatchie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hatchie)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/10 "2022-04-15T15:35:45Z")
Oh, that’s so if the gal wants to know his name, she’s gonna have to undress him! ---
**Author:** ![Hatchie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hatchie/32/3983_2.png) [@Hatchie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hatchie)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2022, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-this-lyric/962841/11 "2022-04-15T15:40:37Z")
There was also “Martian Boogie” by Brownsville Station: He said, “I’ve rocked 'em over And I’ve rocked 'em down Rocked 'em in the country I’ve rocked 'em in town Rock ‘n’ roll, Memphis on up to Maine Up walked up a lady and she asked my name Told her my name was on the tail of my shirt Told her, rocking chair Martian Don’t have to work!”