Quotes about mama

A collection of quotes on the topic of mama, doing, likeness, herring.

Quotes about mama

“My mama always used to tell me: 'If you can't find somethin' to live for, you best find somethin' to die for.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Variant: My Mama used to tell me if u can’t find something to live for, you best find something to die for.
Source: Resurrection, 1971-1996

“So you're a tough guy
Like-it-really-rough guy
Just-can't-get-enough guy
Chest-always-so-puffed guy
I'm that bad type
Make-your-mama-sad type
Make-your-girlfriend-mad type
Might-seduce-your-dad type
I'm the bad guy, duh
I'm the bad guy”

Billie Eilish (2001) American singer-songwriter

"Bad Guy"
When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? (2019)

Bad luck, Sadness, Making love, Guy

“I have a great family, I have great friends, and my mom is like my mama bear. She's the one that's going to tell me 'no' when everyone around me says 'yes.”

Selena Gomez (1992) American singer and actress

Family, Moms

“I don't care what you talkin' 'bout baby.
I don't care what you say.
Don't you come walkin' beggin' back mama.
I don't care anyway.
Time after time I gave you all of my money.
No excuses to make.
Ain't no mountain that I can't climb baby.
All is going my way.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

Bad (1987)

Money, Way, Mountain, Time

“Our song is the slamming screen door,
Sneakin' out late, tapping on your window.
When we're on the phone and you talk real slow
'Cause it's late and your mama don't know.
Our song is the way you laugh,
The first date "man, I didn't kiss her, and I should have."
And when I got home, before I said amen
Asking God if he could play it again.”

Taylor Swift (1989) American singer-songwriter

Our Song.
Song lyrics, Taylor Swift (2006)

God, Way, Home, Kiss

“It's summertime and the living is easy
Fish are jumping and the cotton is high
Your daddy's rich and your mama's good-looking
Hush, little baby don't you cry.”

Sam Cooke (1931–1964) American singer-songwriter and entrepreneur

Summertime
Song lyrics, Sam Cooke (1957)

Fish, Baby, Cry

“Kodachrome,
They give us those nice bright colours,
Give us the greens of summers,
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day,
Oh, yeah, I got a Nikon camera,
I love to take a photograph,
So Mama, don't take my Kodachrome away.”

Paul Simon (1941) American musician, songwriter and producer

Kodachrome
Song lyrics, There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973)

Love, World, Thinking, Summer

“Liza Minelli said she can't sing well enough those "special songs" of her late mother, Judy Garland, so she doesn't sing them at all. The award-winning entertainer said she'd "rather present a first-rate version of myself than a second-rate version of Mama."”

Liza Minnelli (1946) American actress and singer

As paraphrased and quoted in "News Spotlight," https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=S8cxAAAAIBAJ&sjid=PIYDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6062%2C6382171 The Kingsport Daily News (December 11, 1974), p. 9

Singing

“What can I write about Vytautas Juozapaitis? Months ago, a singer with this same name gave one of the most Mozartean accounts of Don Giovanni I've ever experienced: a lean, yet warm sound, exciting and a little on the dangerous side - utterly (and wonderfully) self-absorbed. The man singing Giorgio Germont could not possibly have been this same artist. This was Verdi singing of the highest order - as if to the manor born. A molten, rich expressivity and attention to Verdian line that in its size, detail and musicality recalled the greats: Gorin, Merrill… you get the idea. The name may not trip off American tongues with ease… yet, but in an era often thought bereft of Verdian voices Juozapaitis is the real deal. Every moment of his Germont was filled passion and, like all of the cast members, every word of the Italian was naturally produced and understandable. Mama mia this man's got it!”

Vytautas Juozapaitis (1963) Lithuanian opera singer

Paolo Padillo, "A Traviata of Note: Teatro Lirico d'Europa". Opera - L (March, 2004) http://listserv.cuny.edu/Scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0403d&L=opera-l&F=&S=&P=15287

Music, Idea, Understanding, Nature

“You grew up, we grew up B. C. Before crack. That's just saying it all. You understand? You don't have parents… You have young kids, fourteen, coming home and their mama is smoking out, going to their best friend to get the product.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

1990s, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Atlanta (1992)

Home, Understanding, Parent

“Would you deny for others what you demand for yourself?
Cool down mama, cool off
You speak of signs and wonders, I need something other.
I would believe if I was able, but I'm waiting on the crumbs from your table.”

Bono (1960) Irish rock musician, singer of U2

Lyrics, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004)

Waiting

“Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own.”

Billie Holiday (1915–1959) American jazz singer and songwriter

God Bless The Child
Context: Them that's got shall get
Them that's not shall lose
So the Bible said and it still is news
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own.

God

“I would rather present a first-rate version of myself than a second-rate version of Mama.”

Liza Minnelli (1946) American actress and singer

Liza Minelli, as quoted in I Remember It Well (1975) by Vincente Minelli with Hector Arce, p. 395 https://books.google.com/books?id=D6jDtmiJCpkC&q=minelli+%22second-rate%22+%22first-rate+version%22&dq=minelli+%22second-rate%22+%22first-rate+version%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCoQ6AEwBGoVChMI0on3sqjdxgIVxHg-Ch1NhwVD; reprinted in "Judy and Liza, Part 3" https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=CfpjAAAAIBAJ&sjid=WuYDAAAAIBAJ&pg=7188%2C5401411 by Vincente Minelli, in The Sydney Herald (August 15, 1975), p. 8 <br class="br">Context: I couldn't sing Mama's special songs. I couldn't do them as well. I would rather present a first-rate version of myself than a second-rate version of Mama.

“What I want you to take seriously, is what we have to do for the youth. Because we're coming up in a totally different world. This is not the same world that you had this is not 6th Street its not. You grew up, we grew up B. C. Before crack. That's just saying it all. You understand? We did not grow up without parents. You had parents that told you this and that and told you what went on back in the day. You have young kids, fourteen, coming home and their mama is smoking out, going to their best friend to get the product. You understand what I'm saying? So that means it's not just about you taking care of "your" child. It's about you taking care of "these children". It hurts that I got to, it bothers me, not hurts, that I have to sidestep my youth to stand up and do some shit that somebody else is suppose to be doing. You understand what I'm saying? There's too many men out here for me to be doing this, because it ain't my turn yet. I'm supposed to be following behind him getting the knowledge. I don't even got a chance to get the fucking knowledge. I can't go to college. There's too much problems out here. I don't got the money. Nobody does. You understand what I'm saying? So what I'm saying is, it's not as easy as we're mapping it out to be. We've got to stay real. Before we can be new African we've gotta be black first. You understand? We've gotta get our brothers from the streets like Harriett Tubman did. Why can't we look at that and see exactly what she was doing? Like Malcolm did, the real Malcolm, before the Nation of Islam. You've got to remember, this was a pimp. You know what I'm saying, we forgot about all that. In our strive to be enlightened we forgot about all our brothers in the street, about all our dope dealers, our pushers and our pimps, and that's who's teaching the new generation, because y'all not doing it. I'm sorry. But, it's the pimps and pushers who's teaching us. So, if you got a problem with how we were raised, its because they was the only ones who could do it. They the only ones who did it, because everybody else wanted to go to college, and you know, yeah everything's changed, they were the ones telling you 'the white man ain't shit, there you go, check this out young blood, you take this product, you switch it, you get money and that's how you beat the white man, you get money, you get the hell up out of here.'”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Nobody else did that. So I don't wanna hear shit about nobody telling me who I can't love and respect until you start doing what they did. To me, this is Mecca. This is the black family. You know what I'm saying? But, what makes it that much sadder, what makes me wanna cry, is that when I leave this place, so does Mecca. You understand what I'm saying? We're going back to the real deal. Right out there, you're going see the same sisters and Brenda, they're right out there, and y'all are going to get in your cars and drive the fuck home.
1990s, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Atlanta (1992)

Men, Money, Children, Youth

“Mama, your son in the red hat
Had suffered set-backs, had 'shouldn't-have-said-thats'
Had made everyone mad Give 'em enough of they own rope to hang 'em with
The paparazzi never really got what my angle is
They treat my married life like some type of entanglement.”

Kanye West (1977) American rapper, singer and songwriter

Life of the Party
Lyrics, Donda (2021)

Life, Suffering, Madness

“I don't know why no one ever thought to paste a label on the toilet-tissue spindle giving 1-2-3 directions for replacing the tissue on it. Then everyone in the house would know what Mama knows.”

Erma Bombeck (1927–1996) When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent le…

Past, Housing

“He gave you to me," she said, so low I could hardly hear her. "Now I have to give you back to him, Mama.”

Diana Gabaldon book Voyager

Source: Voyager

“Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to "jump at de sun."”

Zora Neale Hurston book Dust Tracks on a Road

Source: Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), Ch.2 : My Folks, p. 13.
Context: Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to "jump at de sun." We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.

Children, Sun, Mother's Day, For Mother

“There ain't no "baby mama drama" up in this Vortex, homie!”

Esther Hicks (1948) American writer

Baby

“Do you think everybody misses somebody? Like I miss my mama?” “Mmmm-hmmm,” said Gloria. She closed her eyes. “I believe, sometimes, that the whole world has an aching heart.”

Kate DiCamillo book Because of Winn-Dixie

Source: Because of Winn-Dixie

World, Thinking, Heart

“I don't know if mama was right, that we each have a destiny, or if if was Lt Dan, that we are all just floating around, accidental, like on a breeze, but I think… I think… maybe… it's both happening at the same time.”

Winston Groom Forrest Gump

Source: Forrest Gump

Thinking, Time

“Mama--Mama--I want so many things… I want so many things that they are driving me kind of crazy…”

Lorraine Hansberry A Raisin in the Sun

Source: A Raisin in the Sun

“… I do not tell you often enough, dear Mother, how very grateful I am that I am yours. It is a rare parent
who would offer a child such latitude and understanding. It is an even rarer one who calls a daughter
friend. I do love you, dear Mama.”

Julia Quinn (1970) American novelist

Source: To Sir Phillip, With Love

Love, Understanding, Parent, Daughters

“Mama used to say, you have to know someone a thousand days before you can glimpse her soul.”

Shannon Hale book Book of a Thousand Days

Source: Book of a Thousand Days

Soul

“Go to sleep, baby, Mama will sing. Of blue butterflies, and dragonfly wings. Moonlight and sunbeams, raiment so fine. Silver and gold, for baby of mine. Go to sleep, baby. Sister will tell, of wolves and of lambs, and demons who fell.”

Kim Harrison (1966) Pseudonym

Source: Black Magic Sanction

Sister, Sleep, Singing, Baby

“My mama used to say, 'Are you sad? Then just wait a minute.”

Shannon Hale book Book of a Thousand Days

Source: Book of a Thousand Days

Sadness, Waiting

“If you make my children, make any child, feel bad for who they are, I will teach you why people fear mama grizzlies more than papa grizzlies.”

Patricia Briggs book Dead Heat

Source: Dead Heat

Children, People, Fear, Feeling

“Mama says that satisfaction isn't what I should search for. Respect is. Respect?
I detest that word. Probably because in this world you have to respect the wrong people for the wrong reasons.”

Melina Marchetta book Looking for Alibrandi

Source: Looking for Alibrandi

People, World, Search

“Mama was crying, and the rain made it seem as if the whole world was crying.”

Lois Lowry book Number the Stars

Source: Number the Stars

World, Cry

“When your mama was the geek, my dreamlets," Papa would say, "she made the nipping off of noggins such a crystal mystery that the hens themselves yearned toward her, waltzing around her, hypnotized with longing.”

Katherine Dunn book Geek Love

Source: Geek Love

“I know I can't tell you what it's like to be gay. But I can tell you what it's not. It's not hiding behind words, Mama. Like family and decency and Christianity.”

Armistead Maupin (1944) American writer

Family

“You can be a mama's boy, be a daddy's boy, but you can't be both. So you cling to the one you think you might lose.”

Mitch Albom For One More Day

Source: For One More Day

Boy, Thinking

“Pheoby, yuh got tuh go there tuh know there. Yo' papa and yo' mama and nobody else can't tell yuh and show yuh. Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God and they got tuh find out about livin fuh theyselves.”

Zora Neale Hurston book Their Eyes Were Watching God

Source: Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
Context: "Well, Ah see Mouth-Almighty is still sittin' in de same place. And Ah reckon they got me up in they mouth now.""Yes indeed. You know if you pass some people and don't speak tuh suit 'em dey got tuh go way back in yo' life and see whut you ever done. They know mo' 'bout yuh than you do yo' self. They done 'heard' 'bout you just what they hope done happened.""If God don't think no mo' 'bout 'em than Ah do, they's a lost ball in de high grass."

Janie and Phoeby, Ch. 1, p. 16.

God

“Mama was a looker,
Lord, how she shined.
Papa was a good'n,
But the jealous kind.
Papa loved Mama;
Mama loved men.
Mama's in the graveyard;
Papa's in the pen.”

Garth Brooks (1962) American country music artist

Papa Loved Mama, written by Kim Williams and G. Brooks.
Song lyrics, Ropin' the Wind (1991)

Love, Men

“Joanna (Lady of Wales): Mama… why do I not look like you? Why do I have hair black like a crow?
Clemence: Because you take after him. That was all I asked of God, that I need not see him each time I looked into your face. Little enough to ask, I should think. But we do pay and pay for our sins, it seems, and you grow more like him with each day that passes.”

Sharon Kay Penman book Here Be Dragons

Here Be Dragons (1985), Book 1

God, Thinking, Time

“I think it speaks to our basic fundamental feelings, you know. Of emotions, of love, of breakup, of love and hate and death and dying, mama, apple pie, and the whole thing. It covers a lot of territory, country music does.”

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) American singer-songwriter

CNN interview (2002)

Love, Death, Hate, Music

“When, I was just a baby,
My mama told me, son
Always be a good boy,
Don't ever play with guns.
But I shot a man in Reno
Just to watch him die.
When I hear that whistle blowin'
I hang my head and cry.”

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) American singer-songwriter

Folsom Prison Blues
Song lyrics, Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar (1957)

Boy, Baby, Cry

“My father died of neither hot nor cold. My father was as leathern as a saint. He required no trees. As unrefreshed as a Muslim courtyard. He required no fountain. No music. Whenever he saw a baby he said “poor baby.” His questions were the basic questions, as prosaic as footsteps. What is heaven like? Will I be young? Will I be with Mama? Will I go to sleep? (I don’t know, Papa; how can I know?) Absurdly, I gave answers.”

Richard Rodríguez (1944) American journalist and essayist

Brown : The Last Discovery of America (2003)

Music, Question, Sleep, Tree

“There is no way I'm not going to love a state when you enter your borders and you look up at your state flag and you see emblazoned on that a mama grizzly.”

Sarah Palin (1964) American politician

RNC fundraiser, Anaheim, California, , quoted in * 2010-10-16
Palin rallies the faithful in Anaheim while Whitman and Fiorina campaign elsewhere
PolitiCal
Los Angeles Times
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/california-politics/2010/10/palin-anaheim-whitman-fiorina-campaign.html
Referring to the male grizzly bear on California's state flag.
2014

Love, Way

“When you see me now, I'm nothing but a big overgrown tough mama's boy. And I speak that with glee because the problem with society is we don't have enough mama's boys.”

Mr. T (1952) American actor and retired professional wrestler

Attributed

Boy, Problem

“My oh My, what a wretched Life.
I was born on the day that my poor mama died.
I was cut from Her belly with a stanley knife.
My daddy did a jig with the drunk midwife”

Nick Cave (1957) Australian musician

Song lyrics, Tender Prey (1988), Up Jumped the Devil

Life

“Oh Mama, can this really be the end? To be stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again?”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

Song lyrics, Blonde on Blonde (1966), Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again

“They think it is an act. When I said I had back trouble, they call me Mama’s Boy. Goldbrick. When my elbow was swollen as big as a softball, they say it was in my head. If I am sick, I do not deny. If my back is hurting me and I am forced to punch at the ball with no power, I tell the truth. I tell them I am hurting.”

Roberto Clemente (1934–1972) Puerto Rican baseball player

As quoted in "Roberto Clemente: Man of Paradox" by Arnold Hano, in Sport (May 1965)
Baseball-related, <big><big>1960s</big></big>, <big>1965</big>

Truth, Boy, Thinking, Hurt

“Mama, come here quick,
Bring me that lickin' stick.
Mama, come here quick,
Bring me that lickin' stick.
People standin',
Standin' in a trance.
Sister out in the backyard
Doin' the outside dance.”

James Brown (1933–2006) American singer, songwriter, musician, and recording artist

Licking Stick – Licking Stick, written with Bobby Byrd and Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis (1968)
Song lyrics

People, Sister, Dance

“A billion people died on the news tonight
But not so many cried at the terrible sight
Well mama said
It's just make believe
You can't believe everything you see
So baby close your eyes to the lullabies
On the news tonight”

Jack Johnson (musician) (1975) American musician

The News.
Song lyrics, Brushfire Fairytales (2001)

People, Baby

“I think my problem is that I do have the fire in my belly. I am so adamantly supportive of the good traditional things about America and our free enterprise system, and I want to make sure that America is put back on the right track, and we only do that by defeating Obama in 2012. I have that fire in my belly. It’s a matter for me a couple of practical, pragmatic decisions that have to be made. One is, with a large family, understanding the huge amount of scrutiny and the sacrifices that have to be made on my children's part, in order to see their mama run for president! But yeah, the fire in the belly, it's there! That's kind of my problem! It's such a roaring fire in my belly to preserve and restore all that’s good about America, that I struggle with that every single day.”

Sarah Palin (1964) American politician

On the Record with Greta van Susteren
Television
Fox News
2011-05-19
2011

Children, Family, Understanding, Support

“Hey mama, don't you treat me wrong,
Come and love your daddy all night long.
All right now, hey hey, all right.
See the girl with the diamond ring;
She knows how to shake that thing.
All right now now now, hey hey, hey hey.
Tell your mama, tell your pa,
I'm gonna send you back to Arkansas.
Oh yes, ma'm, you don't do right, don't do right.”

Ray Charles (1930–2004) American musician

"What'd I Say", from the album What'd I Say (1957)

Love, Girl, Night

““Mama’s beautiful?” I asked. “Are you blind?” said my brother. “Don’t you see how men and women are always looking at our mother everywhere she goes. Our mother is more beautiful than any movie star you’ll ever see, and yet this isn’t why papa chose her. He chose her, he’s told us a thousand times, because when he first saw her, she was in line to go into the dance hall over in Carlos Malo with her brother and sister. And when a fight broke out, she didn’t get excited and enjoy it like her sister and the other women. No, she and her brother moved away, wanting no part of it, and so, by seeing this, papa knew that she was a woman of high intelligence, respect, and responsibility; a person that he could trust with his life. And trust, remember, is the foundation of all love, papa says.””

Victor Villaseñor (1940) American writer

Burro Genius: A Memoir (2004)

Love, Life, Women, Men

“Who's gonna love you when it all falls down?
Who's gonna love you when your bankroll runs out?
Who's gonna care when the novelty's over?
When the star of the show isn't you anymore.
Nobody cares when the tears of a clown fall down
(I guess your mama never told you what goes around comes back around).”

Mariah Carey (1970) American singer-songwriter

"Clown", Charmbracelet, 2002. Supposedly written about Carey’s brief relationship with Eminem
Lyrics

Love, Star, Tear

“Mama, I know you used to ride the bus. Riding the bus, and it's hot and bumpy and crowded and too noisy, and more than anything else in the world, you wanna get off. And the only reason in the world you don't get off is it's still fifty blocks from where you're going. Well, I can get off right now if I want to. Because even if I ride fifty more years and get off then, it's still the same place when I step down to it. Whenever I feel like it, I can get off. Whenever I've had enough, it's my stop. I've had enough.”

Marsha Norman (1947) American playwright, screenwriter and novelist

Jessie
night Mother (1983)

World, Feeling

“My Mama would never have to work another day of her life.”

Deion Sanders (1967) All-American college football player, professional football player, defensive back, cornerback, wide receiver

speech at Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremony A quote repeatedly said during Sanders' Hall of Fame speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmZc1zb32n4 (8 August 2011)

Life

“Happiness in it's uncut form
Is the feeling that I get, you're warm, warm
Happy's what I get when we do what we do
Happiness, mama, is being with u
Good lord.”

Prince (1958–2016) American pop, songwriter, musician and actor

Girls & Boys
Song lyrics, Parade Under the Cherry Moon (1986)

Happiness, Feeling

“This is for my peoples who just lost somebody,
your best friend, your baby, your man or your lady,
put your hand way up high,
we will never say bye,
mamas, daddies, sisters, brothers, friends and cousins,
this is for my peoples who lost their grandmothers,
lift your head to the sky,
cause we will never say bye.”

Mariah Carey (1970) American singer-songwriter

"Bye Bye", "E=MC²", 2008
Lyrics

People, Way, Sister, Baby

“When the papa found out, he began to shout, and he started the investigation
It's against the law, it was against the law
What the mama saw, it was against the law.”

Paul Simon (1941) American musician, songwriter and producer

Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard
Song lyrics, Paul Simon (1972)

Law

“My mama told me 'baby stay cleanthere's no in between.'but all you ladies and you gentlemen,between is all you've ever seen or been.”

Elliott Smith (1969–2003) American singer-songwriter

A Distorted Reality Is Now A Necessity To Be Free.
Lyrics, From a Basement on the Hill (posthumous, 2004)

Baby

“I will build you a castle with a tower so high
It reaches the moon.
I'll gather melodies from birdies that fly
And compose you a tune.
Give you lovin' warm as Mama's oven.
And if that don't do,
Then I'll try something new.”

Smokey Robinson (1940) American R&B singer-songwriter and record producer

I'll Try Something New (1962)
Song lyrics, With The Miracles

Flying

“So one time for my disillusioned artists, I hear ya
Two times for the kid that air-guitars in the mirror
Three times for the 9-to-5-in' bus ridin' dudes
And four times for my dreamers, yo I'm just like you
That's why I sing for my queens with their own pair of wings
My brothers flyin' beside me, drama behind me
Mama tried to find me, she inquired emphatically
I was in the sky with all these other ghetto kids, defying gravity, uh”

Danny! (1983) American rapper

"Fly, Pt. 2"
Albums, Danny Is Dead (2007)

Singing, Time

“The girl's mouth was chapped, tight and pinched, her skin dry. Mama would say she looked woebegone, but as Bird looked at her eyes, the word she thought of was desperate.”

Patricia Reilly Giff (1935) American children's writer

Source: Water Street (2006), Chapters 21-29, p. 127

Girl, Bird

“Mama and Daddy King represent the best in manhood and womanhood, the best in a marriage, the kind of people we are trying to become.”

Coretta Scott King (1927–2006) American author, activist, and civil rights leader. Wife of Martin Luther King, Jr.

On the parents of her husband, in The Christian Science Monitor (2 July 1974)

Marriage, People

“How many times had she seen Annie sew in a sleeve, easing both sides so that they wouldn't pucker, taking a stitch, and smoothing out the fabric again? And now Mama was doing the same thing to someone's head. Someone's skin.”

Patricia Reilly Giff (1935) American children's writer

Source: Water Street (2006), Chapters 1-10, p. 47

Time

“Every bit of land is a holy land, and every drop of water is a holy water, and every single child is a son or a daughter of the one earth mama, and the one earth papa.”

Michael Franti (1966) American rapper

Hello, Bonjour, Yell Fire! (2006)

Water, Daughters

“A half a Vicodin and a Bahama Mama…makes for a bitchin' day!”

Bill Engvall (1957) American comedian and actor

Here's Your Sign Live! (2004)

“I would love, in all honesty, to do another album with the Mamas and Papas sometime. I miss them. We're still friends and we want to be friends. Because you break up a successful group, which is really what I did, you know, there's some kind of karma here. I don't feel guilty about it; I left the group because I had to. That was being honest.”

Cass Elliot (1941–1974) American singer

Rolling Stone interview (1968)

Love, Feeling, Success

“What's in my veins makes me free
Oh what you have done for me!
Two who made a work of art
Mama brought the armor, Daddy engineered the heart.”

Ysabella Brave (1979) American singer

"Baby One (new original song by Ysabella Brave)" (26 August 2007) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKJ7eaDWsAk

Art, Heart

“You're not supposed to say the word "cancer" in a song.
And tellin' folks Jesus is the answer can rub 'em wrong.
It ain't hip to sing about tractors, trucks, little towns, and mama, yeah that might be true.
But this is country music and we do.”

Brad Paisley (1972) American country music singer

This Is Country Music, written by Brad Paisley and Chris DuBois.
Song lyrics, This Is Country Music (2011)

Music, Singing, Country

“Now I know your mama she don't like me 'cause I play in a rock and roll band.
And I know your daddy he don't dig me but he never did understand.
Papa lowered the boom, he locked you in your room;
I'm comin' to lend a hand.
I'm comin' to liberate you, confiscate you, I want to be your man.
Someday we'll look back on this and it will all seem funny.”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)"
Song lyrics, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle (1973)

Understanding

“[Huh]I can't turn you loose now.
If I do I'm gonna loose my life.
[Ooh]I can't turn you loose now.
If I do I'm gonna loose my life.
I can't turn you loose to nobody
I love you baby, yes I do.
Give shakin' mama, I told ya
I'm in love with only you.
[Gotta] Baby do it baby why don't ya
I'll give ya everything you want.”

Otis Redding (1941–1967) American singer, songwriter and record producer

I Can't Turn You Loose (1965).
Song lyrics

Love, Life, Baby

“Just because you've become a young man now,
There's still some things that you don't understand now.
Before you ask some girl for her hand now,
Keep your freedom for as long as you can now.

My mama told me...'you better shop around'
(Shop, shop around) a-whoa-yeah
You better (uh-huh) shop around.”

Smokey Robinson (1940) American R&B singer-songwriter and record producer

Shop Around, written by Smokey Robinson and Berry Gordy, Jr. (1960)
Song lyrics, With The Miracles

Girl, Understanding, Freedom

Prince (1958–2016) American pop, songwriter, musician and actor

Song lyrics, Parade Under the Cherry Moon (1986)

Love, Women, Age, World

“I get delirious whenever you're near
Lose all self-control, baby just can't steer
Wheels get locked in place
Stupid look on my face.
It comes 2 makin' a pass, pretty mama
I just can't win a race.”

Prince (1958–2016) American pop, songwriter, musician and actor

Delirious
Song lyrics, 1999 (1982)

Stupidity, Baby

“Mama does everything for the baby, who responds by saying Dada first.”

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified

Baby

“But don't you worry 'bout a thing,
Don't you worry 'bout a thing, mama,
'Cause I'll be standing in the side when you check it out.”

Stevie Wonder (1950) American musician

Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing
Song lyrics, Innervisions (1973)

“Meanwhile back at mama's.
The porch light's on, come in if you wanna.
Supper's on the stove and beer's in the fridge.
Red sun sinkin' out low on the ridge.
Games on the tube and daddy smokes cigarettes.
Whiskey keeps his whistle wet.
Funny the things you thought you'd never miss.
In a world gone crazy as this.”

Tim McGraw (1967) American country singer

Meanwhile Back at Mama's
Song lyrics, Sundown Heaven Town (2014)

World, Game, Beer, Light

“Mama always told me not to look into the eyes of the sun.
But Mama, that's where the fun is …”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"Blinded by the Light"
Song lyrics, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)

Sun

“I remember the first time I was sick. I had gone to play with a boy, Luis Léon, and on the patio he threw a wooden log at my foot, and this was the pretext they used at home when my leg began to grow thin. I remember they said that it was a white tumor or paralysis. I missed a lot of school [Frida spent nine months in bed, and and at seven she wore (polio) booties]. I do not remember a lot, but I continued jumping, only not with the right leg anymore. I developed a horrible complex, and I hide my leg. I wore thick wool socks onto the knee, with bandages underneath. This happened when I was seven years old, and my papa and my mama begun to spoil me a lot and to love me more. The foot leaned to the side, and I limped a little. This was during the period when I had my imaginary friend.”

Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) Mexican painter

9 September 1950
Source: 1946 - 1953, "Song of herself"; interviews by Olga Campos, Sept. 1950, Chapter 'My life', p. 65

Love, School, Home, Boy

“I'm a Cranky Old Yank in a Clanky Old Tank on the Streets of Yokohama with my Honolulu Mama Doin’ Those Beat-o, Beat-o Flat-On-My-Seat-o, Hirohito Blues”

Hoagy Carmichael (1899–1981) American composer, pianist, singer, actor and bandleader

1947 song title, generally agreed to be the longest title of any commercially published song.

“You see mama don't watch your damn football
And your beer drinkin' just won't do
You're just stayin' out late
And you're preachin' the hate
And you never have been trueYou see mama she want her somebody
Who will let her be herself
So she's leavin' you
And your stinky damn ways
Cause she's found somebody else”

Ben Harper (1969) singer-songwriter and musician

Mama's Got a Girlfriend Now.
Song lyrics, Welcome to the Cruel World (1994)

Hate, Way, Beer, Football

“My good Mama, I am always the same.... always the same happy life, always fresh for seeing, vigorous for running, and diligent for one end... The Mont Blanc is our alarm clock in the morning, our vis-a-vis are the folk on the other side of the lake of Geneva, (8 leagues). I could not say that we get along badly, though we do dispense with the ceremony of saluting each other and saying bon jour when we look out at the window, for we don't meddle in our neighbors' affairs. Our sight carries fifty leagues about us, and we are equally everywhere, although only occupying the space of our two feet. I am delighted with having received my stretchers in order to commence my view of the Alps. I burn with the desire of fulfilling the difficult task of giving upon canvas an idea of the immensity which surrounds me in order to distribute its benefits to those less fortunate than myself... I ask without scruple, because it seems to me that I have something to give. I have so much confidence in myself, mon Dieu, when I examine myself.”

Théodore Rousseau (1812–1867) French painter (1812-1867)

Quote of Th. Rousseau, in a letter to his mother, late Summer 1834, from the Alps, Switzerland; as cited in Barbizon days, Millet-Corot-Rousseau-Barye by Charles Sprague Smith, A. Wessels Company, New York, July 1902, pp. 152-53
1830 - 1850

Life, Happiness, Confidence, Idea

“All humans are created unequal. You are bigger and stronger than Pop; I am bigger and stronger than Hilda. I have the least years of experience; Pop has the most. Pop is a super-genius…but he concentrates so hard that he forgets to eat…unless he has a nursemaid to watch him—as Mama did, as I did, as Hilda now does. You, sir, are the all-around most competent man I’ve ever met, whether driving a duo, or dancing, or telling outrageous tales. Three of us have eight or nine earned degrees…but Aunt Hilda with none is a walking encyclopedia from insatiable curiosity and extraordinary memory. We two are baby factories and you two are not—but two men can impregnate fifty women—or five hundred. There is no end to the ways that we four are unequal.”

Robert A. Heinlein book The Number of the Beast

Source: The Number of the Beast (1980), Chapter XXXI : “—the first ghosts ever to search for an obstetrician.”, p. 321

Women, Men, Way, Memory

“I'm not perfect, I'm not an angel, but I try to live a certain way because it brings honour and respect to my mother. I tell people that when they look at me, they're looking at nothing but a big, overgrown, tough mama's boy. That's who I am.”

Mr. T (1952) American actor and retired professional wrestler

Attributed

People, Angels, Way, Boy

“It was the first time many of the bands had met and saw each other perform, so we were all really marveling at each other. It was just one good group of people after another. And different kinds of music — from Jimi Hendrix to Ravi Shankar, The Mamas and the Papas to The Who. They had a backstage area where there was food being served 24 hours a day, so everybody was wandering around meeting each other. It was just amazing.”

Grace Slick (1939) American musician, writer and painter

On the Monterey Pop Festival, quoted in Hippie (2004) by Barry Miles, p. 212

People, Food, Music, Time

“Someone’s been eating my porridge said the daddy bear,
Someone’s been eating my porridge said the mama bear,
Hey Ba-ba Re-bear said the little wee bear someone has broken my chair!”

Bobby Troup (1918–1999) American actor and musician

The Three Bears, first sung by the Page Cavanaugh Trio, 1946
Song lyrics

“When I'm not drinkin' baby, you are on my mind. When I'm not sleeping baby, when I'm not sleeping mama, when I'm not sleeping, you know you'll find me cryin”

Jackson C. Frank (1943–1999) American musician

The Blues Run The Game

Sleep, Baby

“If the kid call his grandmama "Mommy" and his mama "Pam", he going to jail!”

Chris Rock (1965) American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer, and director

Bigger and Blacker (HBO, 1999)

“Mama Rhino cries out loud, his nose is always the issue, every time he wipes his nose, he rips apart the tissue.”

Avner Strauss (1954) Israeli musician

Friends of the Rhino (2005).

Time

“How could she know what she wanted to do with her life? All these years she thought she'd be a healer like Mama, and now she knew it was never going to happen.”

Patricia Reilly Giff (1935) American children's writer

Source: Water Street (2006), Chapters 11-20, p. 64

Life

“Debbie Reynolds died a day after her daughter [Carrie Fisher] did! Black Mama's don't die cuz they kids do! They cry and say God don't make no mistakes!”

D. L. Hughley (1963) American actor and comedian

Commenting on the death of Carrie Fisher, and the death one day later of her mother Debbie Reynolds.
Source: [http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2016/12/29/dl-hughley-slammed-for-debbie-reynolds-tweet/95954690/

God, Daughters, Cry

“I hated it. Everybody'd say, "Hey, mama, what's happening?" Then came the Mamas and Papas and I was stuck with it. And now people call me Mama Cass because of the baby. So I don't know whether I'm gonna be able to really get away from it.”

Cass Elliot (1941–1974) American singer

On her dislike of being called "Mama" Cass.
Rolling Stone interview (1968)

Hate, People, Baby