Album: Anything Goes (1934)
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Songfacts®:

  • "You're The Top" is another of Cole Porter's list songs. It was introduced by Ethel Merman and William Gaxton in the 1934 musical Anything Goes.

    According to Robert Kimball in The Complete Lyrics of Cole Porter, the result was that "Porter and the newspapers were inundated with imitations and parodies". P.G. Wodehouse wrote some of the lyrics for the English production.

    Actually, list song is a bit of an understatement; the song mentions Johann Strauss, William Shakespeare, Mahatma Gandhi, Napoleon, Mae West and Greta Garbo, to name but six in no particular order, and that's just some of the people.

    Probably the most obscure allusion occurs in the last verse - which is not always sung; a Drumstick lipstick was manufactured by the French cosmetics firm Charbert.
  • "You're The Top" has long become a standard, and has been widely recorded, principally as a duet, for obvious reasons, including by Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neal in the 1972 comedy What's Up, Doc?. The best selling version was by jazz musician Paul Whiteman, whose orchestral version (also a duet) was released on the Victor label in 1934; it made the Top 5 in the US. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England, for above 2

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