Do you have the Soggy Bottom Boys performing Man of Constant Sorrow?
No ma'am. We got a new shipment in yesterday. Sorry, but we just can't seem to keep it on our shelves.
Based on the real Earl Scruggs mountain folk group The Foggy Mountain Boys, the Soggy Bottom Boys are a fictional singing conglomerate from those Coen brothers' wonderful tribute to Depression-era Southern living, 2000's O, Brother Where Art Thou?.
In the movie, the Soggy Bottom Boys are named on the spot by their leader, Ulysses Everett McGill, on account of his two partners being baptized a might bit earlier in the plot. They proceed to record what can only be described as the biggest hit since the Galveston Hurricane of 1900 in "Man of Constant Sorrow." By the time the boys have reconstituted themselves in civilization, their song has gone big time, despite the fact that nobody is exactly sure just who these Soggy Bottom Boys are. An impromptu shindig at the governor's debate sets the crowd afire, and our boys (escaped convicts one and all) are pardoned then and there by Governor Pappy O'Daniel, and are therefore bona fide.
In real life, the Soggy Bottom Boys' vocals were provided by
Union Station's Dan Tyminski, Nashville songwriter
Harley Allen, and
Nashville Bluegrass Band's Pat Enright. The incomparable
John Hartford and
Ralph Stanley provided the
banjo and
violin instrumentation on "Man of Constant Sorrow" (originally written by Kentucky bluegrass legend
Dick Burnett). For their efforts they received several Country Music Association awards and a
Grammy. Their song topped the country charts at #35.
Whooo boy, that was some mighty fine a-pickin' and a -singin'!