Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. useless, second-rate, inferior.

1896		Ade Artie (1963) 7: The woman that trifled with the piano for about a half an hour was very much on the bummy bum.
1904		Ade ‘The Fable of What Our Public Schools and the Primary System Did’ in True Bills 89: Jimmy resided with his Parents in a bummy little one-story Shack.
1941		‘Digg Mee’ ‘Observation Post’ in N.Y. Age 17 May 9/7: They say it’s [i.e. a newspaper column] sad and kinda crummy, and on that side considered ‘bummy’.
1959		A. Sinclair Breaking of Bumbo (1961) 93: And this bum isn’t going to fight in any bummy, phoney war.
1963		‘Geoffrey Tolhurst’ Flat 4 King’s Cross (1966) 96: I knew I looked like nobody’s fool, and quite good enough for the bummy little club that was all that was left of the Grosniks’ that I had loved so much.
1970		E. Tidyman Shaft 113: The bummy writers insisting on telling them what they almost wrote that day.
2000		P. Beatty Tuff 44: I’m tired of being one of these bummy Raisin in the Sun niggers.

2. ragged, poor, reminiscent of a vagrant.

1978		W.D. Myers It Ain’t All for Nothin 93: [N]o one hardly lived there except some bummy-looking guys.
1986		L. Heinemann Paco’s Story (1987) 161: Carry a rucksack — you look too bummy otherwise, like some slack-assed, shit-for-brains hippie.
1995		(con. 1985–90) P. Bourjois In Search of Respect 159: I couldn’t come in bummy, because my supervisor would tell me, ‘Why you coming in like that?’.
1997		L. Pettiway Workin’ It 17: A lotta guys that look bummy, they don’t be stinking or nothing.
2011		G. Hayward Corruption Officer [ebk] cap. 21: I gave myself a look over. Messed up hair cut - check, bumy [sic] clothes on - check, no jewelry and unshaved check.
2013		K. Koke ‘Fire in the Booth’ 🎵 Money got them looking funny and I'm Fing loving it / F looking bummy.
2017		Young M.A. ‘OOOUUU’ 🎵 Pockets on a chubby chick (ah) / And still go bag a thottie in some bummy shit.