Oh Babe, It Ain't No Lie

Lyrics: Elizabeth Cotten
Music: Elizabeth Cotten

Played by Jerry Garcia in acoustic sets with the Grateful Dead, and also with the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band and in sets with John Kahn. Jerry dedicated his performance with JGAB on 6 December 1987 to the memory of Elizabeth Cotten, who had died earlier in the year (thanks to Dan for pointing this out).

Robett Hunter played a fragment in 1997 as part of an Elizabeth Cotten medley. This is the version played by the Grateful Dead on "Reckoning":

Been all around this whole round world
And I just got back today
I work all the week, honey, and I give it all to you (note a)
Honey baby what more can I do

Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
You know this life I'm living is mighty high

One old woman, Lord, in this town
Keep a-telling her lies on me
Wish to my soul that old woman would die
Keep a-telling her lies on me

Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
You know this life I'm living is very high

Been all around this whole round world
And I just got back today
Work all week, honey, and I get home to you
Honey baby what more can I do

Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
You know this life I'm living is very high

(a) For years, I had this as "... I get home to you" but Mike Scroggins spotted the error and pointed it out to me

With the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band, Jerry started with the "One old woman ..." verse, followed with the "Been all around ..." verse, and then repeated the "One old woman ..."verse

The sheet music in the Jerry Garcia Songbook has a couple of differences in the lyrics, but I don't think they match with what Jerry sang:

Keep a-telling her lies all week
You know this lie I'm living is flying by

Grateful Dead Recordings
	Date	Album
	30 Sep 1980	Reckoning (note 1)
	9 Oct 1980	The Warfield, San Francisco, CA 10/9/80 & 10/10/80
	23 Oct 1980	Reckoning (note 2)
	25 Apr 1981	Sing Out! Bear's Sonic Journals

Jerry Garcia Recordings
	Date	Album	Recorded By
	studio 1976	Reflections	Jerry Garcia (note 3)
	27 Jan 1986	GarciaLive Volume 14	Jerry Garcia/John Kahn
	28 Feb 1986	Pure Jerry: Marin Veterans Memorial Auditorium	Jerry Garcia/John Kahn
	29 Aug 1987	Electric On The Eel (bonus disc)	Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band
	28 Oct 1987	On Broadway: Act One	Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band
	31 Oct 1987	Pure Jerry 2: Lunt-Fontanne	Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band
	6 Dec 1987	Almost Acoustic	Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band

Notes
(1) on the original LP but not included on the original CD (a track had to be cut to fit the double LP onto one CD). It was included on the reissue of "Reckoning" in the box set Beyond Description.
(2) issued as a bonus track in the box set Beyond Description (1973-1990)
(3) bonus track on the reissued album included in the box set All Good Things

Background
Elizabeth Cotten's original version (which Jerry follows pretty closely) can be found on the Smithsonian/Folkways recording of her work "Freight Train and Other North Carolina Folk Songs and Tunes".

As in some of Jerry Garcia's versions, she sings the two verses in the opposite order, and some very minor variations from what Jerry sings:

One old woman, Lord, in this town
Keeps a-telling her lies on me
Wish to my soul that old woman would die
Keep a-telling her lies on me

Chorus
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
Oh babe, it ain't no lie
You know this life I'm living is very high

Been all around this whole round world
Lord I just got back today
Work all week hon and I give it to you
Honey baby what more can I do

[chorus]

Mike Seeger's liner notes say "An unusual blues sung around the Chapel Hill area." In his notes to the song in the "Old-Time String Band Songbook" he similarly says: "A country blues that Elizabeth Cotten learned around her home near Chapel Hill, North Carolina."

But Elizabeth Cotten herself indicated she wrote it--in particular the verse "One old woman ...". This is a (slightly edited) transcription from a video of her performing the song (posted to rec.music.dylan by Itsuko Nishimura):

"They asked me to do 'Oh Babe It Ain't No Lie'. That's the song I wrote about a lady who lived next door to us. My mother had to go to work and this lady would teach children. She told my mother something: made my mother punish me. They hurt me all the day. 'Cause I know what she told my mum was not true.

"That song's 'bout me getting punished. My feelings got hurt, 'cause I did not do what Miss Mary said I did. And I used cry in a bed, and a little verse came to me, a pretty tune came to me, and I made a little song, a little tune I love.

"I used sit on this long porch we had at home. She lived here [Cotten gestures to her left]. I said, 'Glad to see you like to see' so she could hear me.

I was sitting and sing this song, as loud as I want to. And it was about her, and I get playing, and she said to me, 'Sis, that's a pretty song you sang!' You know what I want to say, don't you? 'It's about you!' But I wasn't daresay to let her know. I just say, 'Thank you.' I wasn't daresay to let her know. I didn't let my mother know this little verse was about her, cause mama would punish me sur 'nuff I guess.

And now, they both dead, and they don't know. And don't hear--I don't reckon they do? (laugh) You think they do? Anyway, I feel free to explain and sing it!"

Further Information
For an online discussion of the lyrics to this song see the deadsongs.vue conference on The Well.
For more information on recordings see Matt Schofield's Grateful Dead Family Discography
For David Dodd's discussion of this song on dead.net see Greatest Stories Ever Told
For online chords and TAB see www.rukind.com
For sheet music, see:
Jerry Garcia Songbook (vocal line and chords)