There are of course plenty of blues tunes directed at or about moms on which we could focus this special day, from the more traditional sounds of “Mama Don’t Allow” and Bessie Smith’s “Mama’s Got the Blues” to the likes of “Motherless Child,” “Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean” and even those “Mother-in-Law Blues,” to name just a few possibilities. But we’ve chosen to go all the way down to the bottom with this one from none other than the King of the Blues, Mr. B.B. King, that starts like this:
“You left me for another man, baby,
Tell me what did he do for you.
Yes, you ran away with another man, baby,
I wanna’ know what did he do for you.
Because now all of your money is gone, baby,
And he ain’t got no more use for you.”
And concludes a few minutes later in a way that only B.B. could:
“Nobody loves me but my mother,
And she could be jivin’ too.
Yes, nobody loves me but my mother,
And she could be jivin’ too.
Now you know why I act so funny with you, baby,
When you do the things you do.”
– Nobody Loves Me But My Mother, B.B. King