Who is Lucille Bogan?

Lucille Bogan who also went by the name Bessie Jackson, was known for her risqué lyrics. A blues singer originally from Amory, Mississippi she began recording in 1923. She didn’t begin making her sexually charged songs until a few years later in 1930 singing of prostitution, homosexuality, and sex. She recorded some of the most sexually explicit lyrics of her time. For my music connoisseurs, her nephew was pianist and trumpeter, Thomas “Big Music” Anderson.

It’s said most of her songs were written from the point of view of prostitutes. Her song, Tricks Ain’t Walking No More speaks to that lifestyle. Another song she recorded titled, B D Woman’s Blues (BD referring to Bull Dykes) she wrote the following lyrics…

B.D. women, you sure can’t understand
They got a head like a sweet angel and they walk just like a natural man…
B.D. women, they all done learnt their plan
They can lay their jive just like a natural man…
B.D. women, B.D. women, you know they sure is rough
They all drink up plenty whiskey and they sure will strut their stuff…

Between 1933 and 1935 she recorded over 100 songs with at least three being popular commercial successes. Her song, Black Angel Blues was later adopted by B.B. King and titled Sweet Little Angel. Her final song was recorded in New York on March 5, 1935 and it’s also a favorite of mine, Shave ‘Em Dry. A few of the lyrics are as follows…

I got nipples on my titties

Big as the end of my thumb

I got somethin’ between my legs

That’ll make a dead man come…

I fucked all night

And the night before, baby

And I feel like I wanna fuck some more

Oh, grind me honey

Shave me dry…

Lucille is far from being forgotten. Saffire: The Uppity Blues Women and Asylum Street Spankers have recorded several of her songs. After a failed marriage where she had two children she lived in New York and Chicago. She later moved back to her hometown where she managed her son’s band, Bogan’s Birmingham Busters. In 1948, she passed away in Los Angeles from coronary sclerosis. Thank you, Lucille for standing in your sexual truth!

Erotic Blessings,

Karma Eve