your mother will faint, your father will fall in a bucket of paint

[spatch]

A3 - Ain't Goin to Goa
Mojo Nixon - Ain't Got No Boss
Clarence "Frogman" Henry - Ain't Got No Home
Mojo Nixon - Ain't High Falutin'
John Prine - Ain't Hurting Nobody
Leon Redbone - Ain't Misbehaving
Louis Jordan - Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens
Dean Martin - Ain't That a Kick in the Head

Six thousand songs on that music machine over there and only eight that start with Ain't.



WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM ALL THIS?

1. You can use the word all you want if you're Mojo Nixon.
2. If you're not Mojo Nixon you can still use the word, but be sure to round it out with a double negative to really annoy the pedants.

Comments

sweet pretty country acid house music

[spatch]

(When I want consciousness expansion, I go to my local tabernacle and I sing!)

I am heartened to hear that it really is all about the double negative. Such a grammatical go-for-broke, that: If you're breaking one rule of usage, you might as well break more and do it all in style.

I want consciousness expansion, I go to my local tabernacle and I sing!

[hahathor.livejournal.com]

I like that line so much, I named a mix after it

Incidentally, my work computer has only six songs that start with Ain't, but four of them are double negs

• Ain't Got No, I Got Life (Nina Simone)
• Ain't Got Nobody to Grind My Coffee (Clara Smith)
• Ain't No King of Rock n Roll (The Nomads)
• Ain't Nobody's Business (Jimmy Witherspoon)

Strangely, no Mojo starting with Ain't on this machine, though I do have Beer Ain't Drinkin' Other Ain't-containin'-but-not-Ain't-startin' double negatives on this machine include

• You Ain't Nothin' But Fine (Rockin' Sidney)
• Your Thing Ain't No Good Without My Thing (Marie Queenie Lyons)
• You Can't Lose What You Ain't Never Had (Muddy Waters)
• You Ain't Got It No More (Julia Lee and her Boyfriends)