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Click on the ‘Play’ button above to hear the song and read the lyrics below. If the player doesn’t start straight away, wait and then press the ‘Play’ button again.
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My Mother-in-Law’s Tongue is from the album Rockabilly Boys & Girls, an original album of 10 Rockabilly songs written, produced and with lyrics by Paul Robert Thomas with music exclusively commercially licensed to Paul.
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You can read Paul’s latest music magazine interview HERE
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You can read the just published music magazine’s review of Rockabilly Boys & Girls HERE
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‘This is an incredible track! It takes the classic, time-honored “mother-in-law” trope—which was a massive staple of 1950s and 60s rock ‘n’ roll, blues, and novelty songs (like Ernie K-Doe’s famous hit “Mother-in-Law”)—and gives it a surprisingly dark, gritty, and fiercely rebellious edge. Instead of just a lighthearted joke, your lyrics treat this domestic feud like an all-out, high-stakes battle for survival’.
“My Mother-in-Law’s Tongue” is a fast-paced, high-tension rockabilly track that frames a toxic relationship with a mother-in-law as a brutal war of attrition. The song captures the immense psychological toll, anger, and eventual exhaustion of a narrator desperately trying to maintain their identity and sanity in the face of relentless, “poisonous” verbal abuse. It is gritty, frantic, and darkly humorous. It perfectly balances a driving, aggressive rockabilly rhythm with a universally relatable—yet intensely exaggerated—tale of family dread and psychological warfare.
The central metaphor of the song is the mother-in-law’s tongue, which is described as a weapon “beyond compare” that delivers frightening abuse. Her words are so sharp and devastating that the narrator claims they could “raise the dead” and scare “the devil himself.”
The conflict stems from the mother-in-law demanding the narrator change, grow up, and fall in line. The narrator fiercely resists, declaring a total refusal to become like her (“If I was like her then I would rather die”). Even though the narrator feels “broken” by the criticism, the rock ‘n’ roll spirit shines through in the vow to go down fighting.
A tragic undercurrent runs through the song as the narrator grapples with being “tongue-tied” and forced to swallow their pride (“bite that tongue of mine”). This forced compliance has physical consequences, making the narrator feel prematurely old, visibly distressed, and trapped waiting for the ultimate escape: “when they nail down her coffin lid.”
In a dramatic shift during the final verses, the relentless psychological warfare becomes too much to bear. Out of a desperate desire for peace, the narrator reluctantly waves the white flag, realizing there is ultimately “nowhere to hide, there’s nowhere left to run” when facing this unstoppable domestic force.
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My Mother-in-Law’s Tongue lyrics
Slipping and sliding down this well traveled road
‘Act your age and grow up’ I am told
But I can’t be like her no matter how I try
If I was like her then I would rather die
She puts me down with her poison words
That I try to pretend that I hadn’t heard
Although all this abuse can be frightening
If I’m going down, then I’m going down fighting
I know it’s a battle that can’t be won
When you’re facing your Mother-in-Laws tongue
She says that I’m broken and beyond repair
What does it matter and what do I care
I’ll keep it all inside, I’ll keep it all hid
Till that time when they nail down her coffin lid
Everyone can see the distressed state I am in
Wish I’d learned to take it on the chin
The years roll on by before my eyes
Wish I’d said more, wish I wasn’t tongue tied
She makes me feel old, even though I am young
It can raise the dead, that Mother-in-Laws tongue
Even the devil himself would be scared
Coz her wicked tongue is beyond compare
The way that she treats me is a crime
All I can do is be quite and bite that tongue of mine
Now leave me alone I want some peace
And let all these hostilities cease
I’ll raise the white flag, I’ll raise my hands
I will obey her every command
There’s nowhere to hide, there’s nowhere left to run
When you’re attacked by your Mother-in-Laws tongue
There’s nowhere you can hide there’s nowhere you can run
When you’re attacked by your Mother-in-Laws tongue
Paul Robert Thomas PRS No. 497904008 (London)
PRS Tunecode: 015958MA
Audiosparx Catalogue ID: 1416456 ISRC: US5UL2643884
from Rockabilly Boys & Girls, released May 17, 2026
Written, produced and with lyrics by Paul Robert Thomas with music exclusively commercially licensed to Paul.
all rights reserved
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