The proper lyrics to “Down the Road A Piece” were not, “Mama’s cookin’ chicken fried in bacon grease.” Chuck Berry and the Rolling Stones, copying Berry’s lyrics, got it wrong. The song was about music being played on a piano with a bass and drum accompaniment, and the music can be heard at a place just, “…down the road a piece.”
In the original song, nobody gave a crap about what Mama was doing. She could have been darning her socks, cooking dinner, watching TV, doing the laundry, or getting drunk in the basement. Putting the word “mama” in the song made no sense at all.
But the original lyrics made a lot of sense! The lyrics, from the Will Bradley Trio in 1940, referred to the quality of the boogie-woogie music, and praised it greatly. Here are the lyrics:
Now if you wanna hear some boogie, then I know the place,
It’s just an old piano and a knocked out bass.
The drummer man’s a guy they call Eight-Beat Mac,
You remember Doc and old Beat Me Daddy Slack.
Man, it’s better than chicken fried in bacon grease!
Come along with me boys, just down the road a piece.
Now there’s a place you really get your kicks.
It’s open every night from ’bout twelve to six.
If you wantin’ boogie woogie then you’ll get your fill.
Yeah, it put the eight beats through you like an old steam drill
Come along with me boys ‘fore they lose their lease
It’s just down the road, down the road a piece.
Now, when I found those original lyrics they made me wonder. I normally cooked chicken in the oven, baking it. Never did like it all that much, nor did my chief taster, Louie the cat. So, having a large can of bacon grease, I thought, “Why not?”
Accordingly, I cooked my next batch of chicken in some of that bacon grease. I could scarcely keep Louie from eating all the chicken. WOW! Is that good!!! Never again will I cook chicken any other way. Curses to Chuck Berry and the ‘Stones for keeping this golden information and that wonderful chicken from me all those years.
The original recording is well worth a good listen: