About This Song
About "A Couple of Swells" by Judy Garland
'A Couple of Swells' finds Garland in vaudevillian mode, trading verses with Fred Astaire (on the original recording) in a tramp’s duet. The song is a cartoon of poverty, all exaggerated accents and cheerful delusion—but Garland’s bright delivery masks a flicker of melancholy, as if the joke is a thin shield against real want.
