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Thread: NMC - The Shelton Brothers - Sitting on Top of the World

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    Default NMC - The Shelton Brothers - Sitting on Top of the World

    This is a much-covered tune, but I don't don't know any that accomplish what the Shelton Brothers managed in this early cover of the Mississippi Sheiks' hit song.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcEvTg8-cpk

    The fiddle playing is good, but, as far as I can tell, it's the minor harmonies in the chorus in this cover that throw the lyric ("I'm sittin' on top of the world") into savage irony. I don't know any other cover that plays it that way; most play it straight. But you can't hear this chorus and believe a word that the lyric says.

    I'm a big fan of irony, and part of Hank Williams' legacy is that country music has always had a lot of it (rock, in contrast, has none), but this is deeper and more subtle irony that is common even in country.

    Anyone else hearing something I'm not?
    And now there was no doubt that the trees were really moving - moving in and out through one another as if in a complicated country dance. ('And I suppose,' thought Lucy, 'when trees dance, it must be a very, very country dance indeed.')

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    Default Re: NMC - The Shelton Brothers - Sitting on Top of the World

    Quote Originally Posted by s1m0n View Post
    The fiddle playing is good, but, as far as I can tell, it's the minor harmonies in the chorus in this cover that throw the lyric ("I'm sittin' on top of the world") into savage irony. I don't know any other cover that plays it that way; most play it straight. But you can't hear this chorus and believe a word that the lyric says.

    Anyone else hearing something I'm not?
    I dunno - I'm hearing it straight.
    But I will agree, the genius in this song's lyrics, from a songwriter's pov, is that the exact opposite of 'sitting on top of the world' seems true. Adding to the feeling of loss without wallowing in 'poor me'. I love it.

    Great tune - cool old cover. Thx

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    Default Re: NMC - The Shelton Brothers - Sitting on Top of the World

    Clicked on the link, got "This video is no longer available because the uploader has closed their YouTube account."

    So let's try to imbed it:




    Seems to have worked...

    I don't hear "minor harmonies" in the chorus though. Some who do the song put a 6th-minor chord on "worry," rather than the usual 5th-seventh. but the Sheltons don't.
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