I'm Gonna Dance With The Guy Wot Brung Me - Aileen Stanley & Billy Murray (1927)

"I'm Gonna Dance With The Guy Wot Brung Me"

The Gum Chewers Song

Aileen Stanley & Billy Murray

Victor 20822

1927

Music by Harry Archer

Lyrics by Walter O'Keefe

The opening of the song has the phrase "to trip the lights fantasic."

To "trip the light fantastic" is to dance nimbly or lightly to music. The phrase is attributed to John Milton. In the poem L'Allegro ("The Happy Man"), which is about Euphrosyn (Goddess of Mirth), Milton describes dancing (to "trip") with footwork (toe) that is light and fantastic (fantastic has its roots in the Greek phantastikos meaning able to imagine or make visible).

Milton wrote, "Come, and trip it as ye go / On the light fantastic toe..."

Well, here I am at the Palais de Dance to
trip the lights fantasic. Hm, a swell Jane--
all alone, too. Chewing a hunk of plastic.

She looks like the class, all right.
So I'll have to be polite.

"Hello, dere, babe. Would you give us a dance?"

"Oh, you work so fast you stung me. I'll park me gum and
then, oh kid, I'm gonna dance with the guy what brung me.
Say, you've got a nerve to speak to me. You don't look
like no sheik to me. I'd like to know who sent for you.
And what's more, you're no gentleman. I'm very strict with
etiquette. Some things I don't allow boys. I know all me
P's and Q's. Oh, I bet you're just a drugstore cowboy."

"Not me. I ain't no false alarm. Lay off the gab and grab me arm."

"Oh, go take the air. Say, can't you see?
I'm gonna dance with the guy what brung me."

"You're certainly hittin' on all four with that
gum o' yours. You ain't missed a snap."

"No? Well, you know, they calls me Turtle."

"Ha! I'll say you're snappy. Is my face red at the
things what you said? Some lingo you threw at me!"

"Yeah?"

"I ain't a bad guy. By the looks of your eye,
you're tryin' to high-hat me."

"You think so?"

"Why should you get sore? I could be polite some more. Ah, say, old gal, let's do our stuff. I'll forget the words what stung me."

...me no more. Me mind's made up.
I'm gonna dance with the guy what brung me.
You think you're quite a lady's man,
Like Don Ju-ann or Dapper Dan.
But say, that face of yours is an awful tan,
And I still say you're no gentleman.
Is that so?
Yes, if you'll just look across the hall,
There's one girl over there who's the berries.
Where?
The one who's got that orange hat with all them purple cherries.
Yeah?
You see?
No me. It can't be done.
That dame will dance with anyone.
Ha-ha-ha! Well, I came with Jim and I'm gonna be with him.
I'm gonna dance with the guy what brung me.

Ah, clam yourself and change your mind.
Take back the looks you flung me.
Don't bother me. Say where's me gum?
Gonna dance with the guy what brung me.
We ain't been introduced at all
And they got a rule here in this here hall
To save us girls a nasty fall.
And say, I'd still say you're no gentleman.
Come on now, kid. Let's have a dance.
Now why can't you be pleasin'?