Billboard #1 Hits: #299: “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown”- Jim Croce. July 21, 1973. #1 for 2 weeks in Billboard Hot 100.
- Single: “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown”- Jim Croce
- Record Company- ABC
- Genre: Boogie-woogie
- Written by Jim Croce
- Time: 3:02
- B-side: A Good Time Man Like Me Ain’t Got No Business [Singin’ The Blues}
- Album-Life And Times
- Grade: B-
- Peaked at # 1 2 weeks in Billboard Hot 100. #1 in Canada.
I was twelve in the summer of 1973 and baseball was my only passion- I wasn’t into music but I heard this song on the radio and thought it was great. I would even do something odd for me at the time- I got Jim Croce’s album. Over the years I have changed my mind a little about the song- Jim Croce had a lot of songs that I like better than this story song- but it was his first #1 and as it turned out his only #1 while he was living- he would die in September of 1973 in a plane crash just two months after reaching #1- at the age of 30.
I get the hate – Croce’s use of AAVE (African American Vernacular English) is really questionable – but that chord progression (G-A-B-C-D, all major chords) is simply phenomenal.
Another voice gone too soon.
Always loved this rocker from Jim Croce!