Cover Me: Drinkin’ Wine, Spo-Dee-O-Dee

This is gonna be a long walk, and it goes through a red light district, but trust me: the destination is worth it.

In the early and mid-twentieth century, Sam Theard made a name and a living for himself as a singer, comedian, and actor. Oh, and also a songwriter.

Theard’s songs tended toward the blue end of the spectrum. In 1936, for example, he wrote and recorded “New Rubbin’ on That Darn Old Thing” with Oscar’s Chicago Swinger, featuring lyrics like:

Now she said, “Poppa, don’t you rub so rough
When you hear me holler, then that’s enough
So I start rubbin’, rubbin’ on the darned old thing

She said, “I sure likes the way you rub
You got the best washboard bin in my tub
I start rubbin’, rubbin’ on the darned old thing

And in 1947, Theard co-wrote “Hard Ridin’ Mama” for Wynonie Harris with such memorable lines as:

She don’t use no saddle and she don’t need no guiding lines
She’s a rough riding mama and she treats my pony fine

Can’t find nobody nowhere in this land
Who can ride my pony just like my baby can

And in 1937, he recorded what indirectly became one of his most influential records, “Spo-Dee-O-Dee,” a song about the pleasures of… well let’s just say the title is a euphemism, and the song features lyrics like:

All you gotta do is beat it out
Keep on jiving ’til you hear me shout

Keep on diggin’ don’t you stop
Get your kicks and blow your top

With lyrics like that, “Spo-Dee-O-Dee” was destined to be a classic.

Theard was so fond of his song that he actually started performing and recording under the name Spo-Dee-O-Dee. For those of us old enough to have watched prime-time television in the 1970s, Spo-Dee-O-Dee was an occasional credited guest-star on shows like Sanford and Son and Little House on the Prairie.

But long before that, while Theard was still in the prime of his recording career, another American singer-songwriter was taking inspiration from him.

Granville Henry “Stick” McGhee was a jump blues guitarist from a musical family. (His brother was folk-blues artist Brownie McGhee.) In 1942, Stick joined the military and served in World War II.

Stick brought his guitar with him in the Army and frequently played to entertain himself and his fellow soldiers. On those occasions when alcohol flowed, so did drinking songs, and one of the soldiers’ drinking songs grabbed his attention in particular:

Drinkin’ that mess is our delight,
And when we get drunk, start fightin’ all night.
Knockin’ out windows and tearin’ down doors,
Drinkin’ half-gallons and callin’ for more.

Drinkin’ wine motherf***er, drinkin’ wine
Goddam!
Drinkin’ wine motherf***er, drinkin’ wine
Goddam!
Drinkin’ wine motherf***er, drinkin’ wine
Goddam!
Pass that bottle to me

McGhee was released from the army in 1946, and the following year he recorded and released his own version of his troop’s old drinking song. Obviously, he had to clean up the lyrics a bit, so he borrowed a euphemism from another song about a different adult pastime.

The result was “Drinkin’ Wine Spo-Dee-O=Dee,” and while it didn’t score any action on its original release, when McGhee re-recorded it for Atlantic it peaked at #2 on the Billboard R&B chart for four weeks (and refused to leave the chart for almost six months).

Over the years that followed, “Drinkin’ Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” inspired a river of covers (not to mention the Spodi cocktail) from artists like Wynonie Harris and Jerry Lee Lewis, for whom the song became a staple in live performances.

In 1953, McGhee’s song came perilously close to becoming a novelty song when Donny Baker cleaned it up a bit too much in his single, “Drinkin’ Pop Sodee-O-Dee”

Luckily, the over-21 version maintained its hold on rock-and-roll musicians, and the song continued to spawn new recordings, morphing and evolving along with the genre. By 1959, it was barely recognizable when The Nightcaps dropped the “Spo-Dee-O-Dee” entirely for their arrangement of “Wine Wine Wine.”

I know, I know… where’s the Bruce Springsteen connection, right?

Well, in the summer of 2014, Bruce was on tour in Australia, and a week earlier he’d kickstarted a nightly bit where he played a locally inspired cover, typically a song by an artist who hailed from that region. But when the E Street Band found themselves playing a pair of shows at the Hope Estate Winery in Hunter Valley, the opportunity to play a pair of oenological covers was too rich to resist.

On Night Two, Bruce and the band opened with a slow burn cover of “Spill the Wine” by Eric Burdon and War, but on Night One, they barreled out of the gate with a Seeger Sessions-esque arrangement of “Drinkin’ Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” that took the audience back to the big band era, with a big, big swinging arrangement that ranks among the highlights of that tour.

Notably, Bruce dropped the Spo-Dee-O-Dees from the chorus, too–replacing them with fine (or at least accessible) labels and varietals, leading to a fun mix of shtick and style.

To date, that Hunter Valley opener remains Bruce’s one and only performance of “Drinkin’ Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee.

And yes, I could have taken us here on a much more direct route. But we would have missed a fine tour of early, bawdy rock and rockabilly, and if I’m going to have “Spo-Dee-O-Dee” stuck in my head all day, I want company.

Drinkin’ Wine, Spo-Dee-O-Dee
First performed: February 22, 2014 (Hunter Valley, Australia)
Last performed: February 22, 2014 (Hunter Valley, Australia)