Lyrics: Jesse Fuller/Tim O'Brien
Music: Jesse Fuller/Tim O'Brien
Played by Bill Kreutzmann's BK3 in 2008 . Not to be confused with the song Pigpen sang with Jerry Garcia in the early 1960s.
Been in this prison twenty years or moreThe song was originally written by Jesse Fuller but later modified and recorded by Tim O'Brien. The BK3 version follows Tim O'Brien's, though it misses out one verse and slightly modifies the next verse - this was Tim O'Brien's version of these two verses:
Shot my woman with a forty four
Be right here 'til my dying day
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
Well the food is bad and the beds are hard
We spend all day breaking rocks in the yard
Ain't gonna change, gonna stay that way
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
I never learned to read, never learned to write
My whole life's been one big fight
I never heard about the righteous way
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
Been in this prison twenty years or more
Shot my woman with a forty four
Be right here 'til my dying day
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
Been in this prison twenty years or more
Shot my woman with a forty four
Be right here 'til my dying day
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
[etc]
Ain't no singer who can sing a songJesse Fuller's version is:
No one's saying I ain't done wrong
Nobody told me about the righteous way
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
I never learned to read, never learned to write
My whole life's been one big fight
Ain't gonna change, gonna stay that way
I got ninety nine years and one dark day
Spoken
Here's "Ninety-Nine Years And One Dark Day"
The ninety-nine years is when you got lifetime
The dark day's when you're dead, that's too bad for you
Sung
I committed a crime, many years ago
Shot my woman, with a forty four
She had another man, rolling in my hay
Got ninety-nine years and one dark day
Well, they put me in prison, with a ball and chain
Worked me every day, in the drizzle and the rain
The warden told me, you're here to stay
For ninety-nine years and one dark day
Well, I got in a fight, believe to my soul
They're gonna put me in the dungeon, where it's dark and cold
I laid in the dungeon, all the month of May
Got ninety-nine years and one dark day
Well, the food is bad, and the bed is hard
Don't tell me, go and tell it to the guard
Said to me, be happy and gay
Got ninety-nine years here, and one dark day
Lifetime in prison, they begin to sing
Lifetime in prison, here in the rain
They said to me, be happy and gay
Got ninety-nine years and one dark day
| Recordings | |||||
| Date | Album | Recorded By | |||
| 1958 | (single) | Jesse Fuller | |||
| 1977 | Guess Who's In Town | Tim O'Brien | |||
| 1979 | Hot Rize | Hot Rize | |||