• Song:

    The Sound Of North America

  • Artist:

    Beautiful South

  • Album:

    Blue Is The Colour

D             F#m7               G        D
Ginger Elvis Presley looked a fraction sad
D                 A                   G
Roaming the whole town from bin to bin 
D                  F#m7           G           D         
Well living on the streets wasn't all that bad 
D                      A                G    D
Where no-one seemed to know that he was King 

    Bm
The sound of New York City 
       F#m7
isn't police sirens wailing
         D                    F#m7
It's the sound of Wall Street tills
       G                  D
whilst everyone else is failing 

              F#m7
Sometimes you feel expensive 
Sometimes you feels so cheap 
G                          D       
You can roam the streets a King
G                 D 
Whilst everyone's asleep
                 F#m7
You can mime to any record 
       G              D
With a hairbrush or a spoon
    Gmaj7                         A 
But God help the singer out of tune 

A crippled Mohammad Ali 
looked at bad luck in the mirror 
Bad luck looked back at him and sighed 
He looked a good foot smaller 
and a couple of stone thinner 
And if anyone came toward him 
he would hide 

The sound of North America 
isn't Christians quietly praying 
It's the sound of shuffling feet 
that don't know where they're staying 

Sometimes you feel expensive 
sometimes you feels so cheap 
You can roam the streets a King 
whilst everyone's asleep 
You can fight with anybody 
with a glimmer of a chance 
But God help the boxer with no hands 

A homeless Greta Garbo 
moves across the street 
The moonlight shining clearly 
through her skirt 
A real life living legend 
that no-one wants to meet 
And that's when being Garbo 
really hurts 

The lyrics of "New York" 
may have Frank Sinatra singing 
But the rhythm and the melody 
were dead black men swinging 

Sometimes you feel expensive 
sometimes you feels so cheap 
You can roam the streets a Queen 
whilst everyone's asleep 
You can act with anybody 
from the cradle to the crypt 
But God help the actress 
who doesn't know the script
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