Sleepy Head

Words & Music by Gus Kahn & Walter Donaldson
Recorded by The Mills Brothers, 1934


 A      G#7  C#7                 F#7
Sleepy Head, come on, get out of bed.

 D9                 Dm6            Cdim           B7
Ain't you heard the rooster crow?  Must've been a week ago,

D9       Dm6     Bm7-5  E7  A   Edim  E7
Good-for-nothing Sleep - y Head.


A      G#7   C#7                       F#7
Sleepy Head, see the sun so bright and red?

D9                 Dm6            Cdim             B7
He's been up and ridin' high, but you just let the time go by,

D9       Dm6     E7    Bm7-5  A   
Good-for-nothing Sleep - y  Head.


A      G#7  C#7                 F#7
Sleepy Head, I'd take away that bed,

D9                 Dm6      Cdim               B7
But you're such a lazy pup, you'd be sleeping standing up,

D9       Dm6     Bm7-5  E7  A   Edim  E7
Good-for-nothing Sleep - y Head.


A      G#7   C#7                 F#7
Sleepy Head, underworked and over fed,

D9              Dm6            Cdim           B7
Gonna sleep the day away, "But this is such a sleepy day,

   D9    Dm6    E7 Bm7-5  A    Edim  E7
"I wanna be a Sleep - y Head."


A      G#7   C#7                   F#7
Sleepy Head, got to get you out of bed;

D9                Dm6            Bm7-5    Cdim     B7
"You just stand around and shout until you get me tuckered out,

    D9      Dm6   Bm7-5  E7  A   D9   A
I'm bound to be a Sleep - y Head."


Bridge:

 Am      F7        Am     F7      Am
Big boy, don't you know today is Sunday?

Am        F7     Am     F7       Am
That's no day to lay around and doze.

  A     D9      A     D9        A       F#7
"Sunday is the day I sleep til Monday --

B7                             Cdim Bm7-5    E7
That's the way I save my go-to-meet - in' clothes."


A      G#7          C#7                   F#7
Sleepy Head, you're gonna be a long time dead;

D9               Dm6             Bm7-5      Cdim     B7
Gabriel's gonna blow his horn, but you won't hear it if it's morn,

D9       Dm6     Bm7-5  E7  A
Good-for-nothing Sleep - y Head.



Coda:

C#m7-5 Fdim(III) F#7    D9       Dm6      E7  Bm7-5 A
"I      heard    you!"  Good-for-nothing Sleep - y Head.


This one is from that group of now largely forgotten classics by the Mills Brothers that featured their early trademark of "instrumental breaks" that were not instrumentals at all -- it was the singers mimicking musical instruments with nothing but their voices. It was this skill that put the brothers "on the map," so to speak.


 
The lyric and guitar chord transcriptions on this site are the work of The Guitarguy and are intended for private study, research, or educational purposes only. Individual transcriptions are inspired by and and based upon the recorded versions cited, but are not necessarily exact replications of those recorded versions.