Why I Sing The Blues

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Yes, everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long, long time

I really paid my dues

When I first got the blues, they brought me over on a ship

Men standing around me, lots more with a whip

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long, long time

People, I paid my dues

When I laid in the ghetto flat, cold and numb

I heard the rat tell the bedbug to give the roach some

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long time

I really paid my dues

I stood in line, y'all, down at the county hall

I heard some men say, "We gonna build some new apartments for y'all"

And everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long, long time

Yes, I really, really paid my dues

My kid's gonna grow up, y'all, to be a fool

They ain't got no more room for him in school

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long, long time

I really paid my dues

Yes, the doctor told me, "Yes, you were born to lose"

Seem like everybody around me, people

Seem like everybody got the blues

But I had 'em a long time, I really paid my dues

Well, you know I'm not ashamed of it

People, I just love to sing my blues

Well, I walked in the city on my bare feet

I had a field of catfish chilling down on Beale Street

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long time, y'all

I really paid my dues

Now, father time is catching up with me, gone is my youth

I look in the mirror and say, "Tell me the truth"

I'm singing the blues, y'all, mhm, I just love to sing the blues

See, I've been around a long time, y'all

I really, really paid my dues

I thought in the land and country, everything would be fine

But they in the country had trouble just like mine

I got the blues, y'all, I just love to sing my blues

I've been singing the blues, y'all

I've been singing the blues a long, long time

One more time, now listen

A blind man standing on the corner, begging for a dime

Police got him and put him in jail, charged him for a crime

Everybody wants to know why I sing the blues

Well, I've been around a long time, y'all

I really paid my dues

Can we give it up for him? Let's do one more

I thought I would go downtown to the welfare

Get me the breakfast stuff

But a lady stood up and said, "You ain't been around long enough"

That's why I sing the blues, y'all, mmm, I sing the blues

See, I've been around a long, long time

People, I paid my dues

Haha, play the blues!

Ah, that's all right, fellas, yeah

And my name is Bobby Rush

Salute to my friend B.B. King, the late B.B. King, that is

Yeah, that man I looked up to all my life

And an old man myself

B.B. King, my father of the blues

Haha, father of the blues

Salute to B.B. King