Songfacts®:

• Rusty & Doug were the brothers Rusty and Doug Kershaw. From 1955 to 1961 they released five singles, all of which cracked the Top 25 on the Country chart. The brothers both joined the Army in '59, putting their music on hiatus. When they got back together in 1961 they released "Louisiana Man," an upbeat, fun song about a man born in the Louisiana bayou, hunting, fishing, trapping, making a living off the land. The song was written by Doug Kershaw.
• Connie Smith had a #14 Country hit with her cover in 1970. After putting the song out as a single she included it on her I Never Once Stopped Loving You album, released later that year. Other popular covers of "Louisiana Man" are by the Pozo Seco Singers, Bobbie Gentry, Rick Nelson, Gene Pitney, the Seekers, Harpers Bizarre, and Jan & Dean.
• Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter wrote "Black Peter" with "Louisiana Man" in mind. Dead frontman Jerry Garcia changed the song so much that by the end there's no trace left of this connection, but Hunter mentions it in his book of collected lyrics, Box of Rain.
• The Alabama song "If You're Gonna Play in Texas (You Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band)" mentions this song in its chorus.
  
  If you're gonna play in Texas,
  You gotta have a fiddle in the band
  That lead guitar is hot,
  But not for "Louisiana man"