Cell Block Tango

Album: Chicago (1975)
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Songfacts®:

  • With music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, this is another track from the musical vaudeville Chicago, and is pretty much what it sounds like, a dance number set in a cell block.

    The song's refrain is "He had it coming", and it is performed by a number of women accused of murdering the men in their lives who literally had it coming.
  • Like Roxie Hart the hapless heroine, accused murderess Velma Kelly - one of the performers in this song - was based on a real character - Belva Gaertner, who 1924 stood trial for the murder of her lover Walter Law. At her trial she pleaded amnesia due to drink, and was acquitted by an all male jury. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England, for above 2

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