Signifying Mary Johnson: I Just Can't Take It, 1936

With Texas flooding and fires in Detroit as I post, a little more on St. Louis blues singer Mary Williams Smith Johnson (b. ca. 1900-1905, Eden Station, Mississippi, d. 1970, St. Louis?). I should mention her 1925-1932 marriage to Lonnie Johnson (b. 1889 or 1894, 1899 or ca. 1900?-d. 1970), one of the great "connectors," a man linked within one or two degrees of separation to hundreds of other musical artists, a dude who knew New Orleans in the time of Storyville, Europe during the Great War, the loss (in Louisiana) of all but his brother James to the Spanish Influenza, and the urban blues excitement of St. Louis, Chicago, New York, even Toronto -- and on and on. Lonnie (and his brother James) had also recorded with Luella Miller, and then along came Mary -- they are reported to have had five kids, but what happened to said children if they did, I have no clue at this juncture.

Here are the lyrics to "I Just Can't Take It," recorded in 1936, after which Signifying Mary Johnson seems to have stopped recording, so far as I know:

Man I love is only five feet four
He told me this morning
He couldn't use me no more
I said Daddy I just can't take it
Daddy I just can't take it
Daddy I just can't take it
I swear that he's stealing from me

Well he told me to leave his window
Don't even knock on his door
Little things he used to do
He don't do them no more
Well I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
I swear that he's stealin' from me

Play it Peter* play it

Well he told me people
He told me to my face
He had another woman
He know to take my place
I said I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
I swear that he's stealing from me

Daddy you got the hot stuff
Yo Mama got the buns
Let's get together and have some fun
Well I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
Well I just can't take it
I swear that he's stealin' from me

*Presumably Peetie Wheatstraw, on piano. The recording I'm working from is probably a little slower than the actual tempo, judging from Mary's spoken quips. In fact, if you up tempo the song, it sounds remarkably like Hank Williams' "Move It On Over" (1947) and "Mind Your Own Business" (1949), opening up the intrigue of cross-influences.

Today's Rune: Protection.