Bad, Bad Leroy Brown Lyrics
Is the baddest part of town
And if you go down there
You better just beware
Of a man named Leroy Brown
You see he stand 'bout six foot four
All the downtown ladies call him "Treetop Lover"
All the mens just call him "Sir"
The baddest man in the whole damn town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
And he like his fancy clothes
And he like to wave his diamond rings
In front of everybody's nose
He got a custom Continental
He got an Eldorado too
He got a 32 gun in his pocket for fun
He got a razor in his shoe
The baddest man in the whole damn town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Leroy shootin' dice
And at the edge of the bar
Sat a girl named Doris
And ooh that girl looked nice
Well he cast his eyes upon her
And the trouble soon began
And Leroy Brown learned a lesson
'Bout messin' with the wife of a jealous man
The baddest man in the whole damned town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog,
And when they pulled them from the floor
Leroy looked like a jigsaw puzzle
With a couple of pieces gone
The baddest man in the whole damn town
Badder than old King Kong
And meaner than a junkyard dog
Quote from Wikipedia: Croce's inspiration for the song was a friend he met in his brief time in the US Army: I met him at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. We were in lineman (telephone) school together. He stayed there about a week, and one evening he turned around and said he was really fed up and tired. He went AWOL, and then came back at the end of the month to get his paycheck. They put handcuffs on him and took him away. Just to listen to him talk and see how 'bad' he was, I knew someday I was gonna write a song about him.
He told a variation of this story on The Helen Reddy Show in July 1973:
This is a song about a guy I was in the army with... It was at Fort Dix, in New Jersey, that I met this guy. He was not made to climb the tree of knowledge, as they say, but he was strong, so nobody'd ever told him what to do, and after about a week down there he said "Later for this" and decided to go home. So he went AWOL—which means to take your own vacation—and he did. But he made the mistake of coming back at the end of the month to get his paycheck. I don't know if you've ever seen handcuffs put on anybody, but it was SNAP and that was the end of it for a good friend of mine, who I wrote this tune about, named Leroy Brown.
Croce explained the chorus reference to Leroy Brown being "meaner than a junkyard dog":
Yeah, I spent about a year and a half driving those $29 cars, so I drove around a lot looking for a universal joint for a '57 Chevy panel truck or a transmission for a '51 Dodge. I got to know many junkyards well, and they all have those dogs in them. They all have either an axle tied around their necks or an old lawnmower to keep 'em at least slowed down a bit, so you have a decent chance of getting away from them.
I agree most with BakedGoodies on this one. The man who took down Leroy Brown was only described as "jealous," not necessarily small, but presumably smaller than Leroy. "Even the mighty fall" is pretty accurate. I might describe it more as a story of not underestimating the power of emotion. Being big, mean, and respected was trumped by simple jealousy.
Its a badass song, but my question is, what the fuck is a treetop lover?
Just a nickname someone might have given him since he was rather tall.
Just a nickname someone might have given him since he was rather tall.
this is such a great song. ah, i love it when people who think they are badasses get monkey-stomped when they cross the line with someone they underestimated. guess it is just fun to see the "baddest man" get laid out by an average dude when he pushes him too far.
Considering how fearsome Leroy sounds, I'd hate to see the guy who bested him.
Considering how fearsome Leroy sounds, I'd hate to see the guy who bested him.
This is one of those weakling-power anthems. Leroy Brown is that big, ugly kid who got all the good-looking girls in high school just because he was tough. Literally speaking, he crossed somebody stronger than him, figuratively, I think it has more to do with the fact that people like Leroy always get left behind in life.
a couple friends and i made a music video with this song. it went pretty well, even though we were all laughing when our 5' 2" "Leroy" was beating me up.
yeah, this is definitely the under-rated guys anthem.
reminds of the old saying: "the bigger they are, the harder they fall"
To me he just seemed like he thought he was a badass and someone put him in his place. I don't see were it says it was a smaller guy, but I guess if you're a smaller guy this would be an empowering song for you.
Great song. It still gets played on the Vegas classic rock station nearly daily.
Not quite sure how you guys got this is a song rooting for the underdog. It says he is 6'4 in the song, so...not exactly a shortie either.
Leroy Brown was someone Croce knew during the war. In the song, he's a rough bad ass from the wrong side of town, down to get violent when he needs to. Everyone respects him (hence the "treetop lover" and "sir") out of fear. But when he flirts with a married woman, he gets killed by the husband.
It's more of an "even the mighty fall" type of story. Not an underdog story at all, since the husband isn't described besides being jealous.
@BakedGoodies how do you know Leroy dies? I always thought that he just caught a bad beating.He learned a lesson about messin with a jealous mans wife,meaning he lived to be able to have learned.A jigsaw puzzle with a couple pieces lost means the gun in his pocket and the knife in his shoe were missing.
@BakedGoodies how do you know Leroy dies? I always thought that he just caught a bad beating.He learned a lesson about messin with a jealous mans wife,meaning he lived to be able to have learned.A jigsaw puzzle with a couple pieces lost means the gun in his pocket and the knife in his shoe were missing.
James,
James,
I always assumed the jealous man cut him up so bad he was in pieces... like a jigsaw puzzle, and presumably died of his injuries. That having been said, the last chorus is still in the present tense. In "You Don't Mess Around With Jim," the last chorus changes to reflect Jim's death at the hands of Slim.
I always assumed the jealous man cut him up so bad he was in pieces... like a jigsaw puzzle, and presumably died of his injuries. That having been said, the last chorus is still in the present tense. In "You Don't Mess Around With Jim," the last chorus changes to reflect Jim's death at the hands of Slim.
If you read "Cirque Du Freak", you'll see that Steve was just like Leroy Brown but worse. He and Desmond Tiny would make Leroy look like an angel. Then in "Sons Of Destiny", Darren was just like the jealous husband, as he had killed Steve. Then, Steve killed him so Darren wouldn't become the Lord of the Shadows.