Most definitely not to be confused with the AC/DC song of the same name, "Anything Goes" is one of American musical composer Cole Porter's most well-known and cleverly crafted songs. The sheet music from the show of the same name by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton was published by Chappell of London at 2 shillings, copyright Harms of New York, 1934. The show was a Charles B. Cochran presentation. Sung by Ethel Merman and ensemble, Robert Kimball says in The Complete Lyrics Of Cole Porter, "The lyric for an earlier version of the first refrain was found in a copyist ink score at Warner Brothers Music warehouse, Secaucus, New Jersey, February 1982. Over the years Porter revised the sequence of the song's three refrains. Presumably, his final thoughts are set down in the version published in The Cole Porter Song Book (1959)."
Although basically a love song, this is also a mild rant at the way social mores change (as ever for the worse). In olden days a glimpse of stocking may have been looked on as something shocking, and contemporary writers may have taken to using four-letter words, but did anything really go in the '30s? Porter was no shrinking violet: "Love For Sale," one of his most famous songs, was written around this time and fell foul of the censor because of its overt reference to prostitutes. Had he lived to see punk rock and the gratuitous profanity, sex and violence of the modern cinema and other art forms, however, he might well have revised his opinion.
Australian actress Caroline O'Connor performed this song in the 2004 Cole Porter biopic, De-Lovely, named for the Porter song.
See your Spotify stats (with number of plays and minutes listened) and discover new music.
Music data, artist images, album covers, and song previews are provided by Spotify. Spotify is a trademark of Spotify AB.