Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. showy nonsense, boasting.

1885		Daily Democratic Times (Lima, OH) 14 Dec. 3/4: Three brothers, Taylor, John and William Oakes, in the lightning-rod business, were arraigned before ’Squire Jas. May, at Celina, Saturday on a charge of black-mailing Joseph Selby out of $600 with crooked contracts for rods, as the evidence showed they had given Selby the razzle-dazzle for $300 in cash and a team of horses.
1906		‘O. Henry’ ‘Lost on Dress Parade’ in Four Million (1915) 229: Perhaps if I’d told her the truth instead of all that razzle-dazzle we might — but, confound it! I had to play up to my clothes.
1924		E.G. Murphy ‘It Appears’ Dryblower’s Verses 76: It appears that Mr. Razzle-Dazzle, who puts on side and swank, / Has scarcely got a hundred to his credit in the bank.
1985		E. Leonard Glitz 276: All this hip shit [...] The casino business, all this razzle-dazzle. All the people thinking they know everything.
2003		G. Tate Midnight Lightning 35: He prized gut reactions above the whoring of razzle-dazzle.

2. in fig. use, e.g. a bad situation (cit. 1903 refers to toothache).

1886		L.A. Herald 18 Nov. 3/1: Razzle Dazzle, in the vocabulary of the gamblers, stands fora streak of bad luck.
1903		Bulletin (Sydney) 5 Nov. 17/1: Travelled in a train, t’other day, with a huge woodchopper, who was in convulsions on account of a back tooth being on a razzle-dazzle.
1899		E. Townshend ‘Chimmie’s Cold Strategy’ 12 Jan. [synd. col.] De Duchess don’t do a ting to me but give me a razzle-dazzle.

3. confusion, chaos, often deliberately engineered to ‘blind’ the onlooker.

1886		Atlanta Constitution 10 Aug. 8/4: The Champions were given the razzle dazzle by the Nashville team yesterday and dropped down five points in the race for the pennant.
1900		A.H. Lewis ‘Arabella Weld’ in Sandburrs 167: I’ll fake it I’m an off’cer, see! I’ll give her the razzle dazzle of her existence, an’ square youse wit’ her.
1922		B. Hecht A Thousand and One Afternoons [ebook] But the city was such a razzle-dazzle of dreams, tragedies, fantasies [...] that it filled the newspaper man's thought from day to day with an irritating blur.
1958		E. Dundy Dud Avocado (1960) 30: You know all that razzle-dazzle about people being born in Original Sin and all that rot?
1966		J. Mills Panic in Needle Park (1971) 152: [He] knows that all this search-and-seizure razzle-dazzle in the court is probably going to let him beat the case.
1987		W.T. Vollmann You Bright and Risen Angels (1988) 325: All that engineering static and circuitous circuitry razzle-dazzle.

4. as ext. of sense 1, a form of confidence trick.

1887		Ft Worth Dly Gaz. (TX) 29 Aug. 6/4: ‘You wan’t stand the razzle dazzle, eh?’ [...] To razzle-dazzle — the employment of means such as a criminal might use were he to quickly throw the glare of a concealed bulls-eye lantern on his prey, who thus blinded would become an easy victim.
1897		Ranche & Range (N. Yakima, WA) 27 May 9/1: Should anybody come to you and whisper, ‘I’ve got a scheme for getting cash [...] And I’ll let you in’ [...] he is very sure to work the razzle-dazzle.
1927		D. Hammett ‘The Big Knockover’ Story Omnibus (1966) 290: Tom Brooks [...] who invented the Richmond razzle-dazzle and bought three hotels with the profits.
1929		D.H. Clarke In the reign of Rothstein 112: [chapter head] The Razzle-Dazzle In Stocks.
1947		F. Brown Fabulous Clipjoint (1949) 122: Well, to-morrow we can try a couple more razzle-dazzles.

5. (US carnival) a merry-go-round.

1892		S. Crane in N.-Y. Trib. 17 July in Stallman (1966) 269: There is a ‘razzle-dazzle,’ [...] It is a sort of circular swing [...] the machine goes around and around with a sway and a swirl, like the motion of a ship.
1972		(con. 1930s) N. Algren ‘The Last Carousel’ from Playboy in Texas Stories (1995) 140: Past the stand that sold what I called cotton candy but Doggy called sweetened air. Past the flavored drinks that I called pop but Doggy called flukem. Past what I called a Ferris wheel but Doggy called the chump-heister. Past what I called the merry-go-round, but Doggy called the razzle-dazzle.

6. in attrib. use of sense 2.

1887		Ft Worth Dly Gaz. (TX) 29 Aug. 6/4: The expressive compound has been applied to the cheap and fiery vaiety of liquids sold in [...] ‘barrel-houses.’ ‘Razzle-dazzle booze’ carries it own meaning with it.
1903		Coconino Sun (Flagstaff, AZ) 21 Mar. 3/3: Let us see to it that the [...] government tries not to give us any razzle-dazzle racket; if they do we will drop the whole business like a hot potato.

7. enjoyment, pleasure, celebration: usu. as a result of drinking.

1889		Pittsburgh Dispatch (PA) 17 Feb. 10/6: [The song’s] refrain ‘razzle dazzle, razzle dazzle’ is slang for a hilarious and dilapidated condition of drunkeness.
1889		Eve. World (NY) 1 Mar. 1/1: Razzle-dazzle means a good old-fashioned drunk [...] when a man is on a lark he is razzle-dazzled.
1889		Gallup Gleaner 18 Mar. 4/2: A Kansas paper [...] recently told of a ‘regular old razooper, who, having got a skate on, indulged in a glorious razzle-dazzle’ [DA].
1890		Music Hall & Theatre Rev. 3 May 5/1: The Waster [...] returned on Saturday. As usual he was in a state of razzle-dazzle.
1895		W. Pett Ridge Minor Dialogues 263: Fact of it is, out at a smoker last night, three of us, all good sorts, and had the fairest old razzle-dazzle you ever dreamt of.
1903		Sun. Times (Perth) 26 July 4/7: An unsuspecting inkslinger in the employ of the Sunday Times [...] set out for the razzle-dazzle of the shellback’s shivoo.
1906		‘O. Henry’ ‘Lost on Dress Parade’ in Four Million (1915) 223: He was a true son of the great city of razzle-dazzle, and to him one evening in the limelight made up for many dark ones.
1918		C. Sandburg ‘Band Concert’ in Cornhuskers 🌐 God knows, gigglers daffy with life’s razzle dazzle.
1926		Wood & Goddard Dict. Amer. Sl.
1950		Time 2 Jan. 44/1: Lady Bullfighter Conchita Cintron declared that she would give up the razzle-dazzle of the ring for the tranquillity of marriage [DA].
1965		W. Dick Bunch of Ratbags 247: New sayings like [...] ‘Gettin’ a bit of Razzle-Dazzle?’.
1980		H. Lunn Behind Banana Curtain 56: Oh, the good old days are gone with the blacks. You can’t give them a bloody razzle dazzle like you used to be able to.

8. (US) group sex, an orgy.

1893		‘Bob Sterling’ Town-Bull 56: To-night he is coming to have a razzle-dazzle with you and me.
1902		D. St John Memoirs of Madge Buford 51: [We] rested after the effects of our three readed [sic] razzle-dazzle.
1902		D. St John Memoirs of Madge Buford 104: ‘By Jove, Jack. She ain’t bad. Damn the cost. Let’s take her to Mother Jones for a short razzle dazzle’.

9. extravagant publicity.

1978		L. Kramer Faggots 182: [I shall] interject casually that I am responsible for the movie that nine out of ten faggots simply adore and then another dollop of wit and razzle-dazzle.
1991		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper From The Inside 53: Sydney may have all the razzle dazzle but most of the deadly serious work gets done in Melbourne.