Misunderstood Lyrics

[Peter Wilson]

I guess the all-time classic is CCRs' Bad Moon Rising.

People thought they were singing: There's a bathroom on the right...
Actual lyrics: There's a bad moon on the rise...

(So I'm told...never suffered that particular mixup)

Some of my favorites:

Thought Elton John was singing: ...And you can tell everyone, this is a song...
Actual: ...And you can tell everyone, this is your song...

Thought Daniel Powter was singing: The ponies they laugh at what you say..
Actual: The point is they laugh at what you say

Thought what's-his-name was singing: I was walking in Memphis//I was walking with my feet 10 feet off the beal (?)
Actual: I was walking in Memphis//I was walking with my feet 10 feet off The Beale

What's your favorite misunderstood lyric?

[ToSeek]

Somehow I always hear

Hold me close, tiny dancer

as

Hold me close, I'm tired of dancing.

Don't ask me why.

[Tog]

The classic one is: 'scuse me while I kiss this guy
Instead of : 'scuse me, while I kiss the sky
By Jimi Hexdrix

Some others:
Heard: Bingo jet had a light on
Is: Big old jet airliner

Heard: The girl with colitis goes by
Is: The girl with kaleidoscope eyes

Heard: She's got a got a chicken to ride (my baby donkey)
Is: She's got a ticket to ride (my baby don't care)

One of my personal ones:
Heard: Hush hush. We been found out. This is scary.
Is: Hush hush. Keep it down now. Voices carry.

Due to possible language issues, no link, but Google kissthisguy.com and you should run into a LOT of these.

[brianok]

First few times I heard it I thought that

"Penny Lane"

was

'then Elaine"

[mickal555]

By me
Recently

I heard:
I cann't overcome the continues
I don't understand the point of fingers
I don't understand the point of fingers

Actual
The argument of over god continues
All of us stand and point out fingers
All of us stand and point out fingers

In the past
I heard:
they gave paradise to put a f***ing lie

Instead of
They paved paradise to put up parking lot

[The skeptic]

'Me ears are alight', Desmond Dekker...

[Roy Batty]

Kenny Rogers:
"You picked a fine time to leave me loose wheel, with 4 hungry children & a Croc in the field"

(That version actually recorded by The Baron Knights IIRC:))

[The skeptic]

Queen: 'Devil for a sideboard'

Queen: 'Down in the dungeons with Peters and Lee'

[planethollywood]

Cold Chisel classic,

As heard: Cheap wine and a three day goat.

Actual: Cheap wine and a three day growth.

[94z07]

Somehow I always hear

Hold me close, tiny dancer

as

Hold me close, I'm tired of dancing.

Don't ask me why.

This was on "Friends" as "...hold me closer Tony Danza"

[Blue Fire]

Please don't laugh to hard, but while in gradeschool, I could never figure out why people at the beginning of baseball games were so worried about whether some spanish guy Jose' could see or not. "Jose, can you see, by the dawn's early light?" Please tell me other folks have fallen prey to that.

[Peter Wilson]

That's a joke, right?

[94z07]

10,000 maniacs

What I heard: “…<unintelligible mumblings> …thinking about the weather”

Actual lyrics: “Server me! Server the dark goddess! Love me and despair!…thinking about the weather”

[Graybeard6]

To go WAY back; my sister and I were both convinced we heard these lyrics in "The Harvey Girls" : "They have ashes in their peaches in Sana Fe"
Actual: "On the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe".

[Peter Wilson]

There's a metal song, which I'm not much into so I don't even know the band, but I could never tell whether the chorus was

Flat bottomed girls they make the world go round

or,

Fat bottomed girls they make the world go round

or

[something entirely different]

Anyone know that song? Any ideas?

[Tog]

There's a metal song, which I'm not much into so I don't even know the band, but I could never tell whether the chorus was

Flat bottomed girls they make the world go round

or,

Fat bottomed girls they make the world go round

or

[something entirely different]

Anyone know that song? Any ideas?

Queen- Fat Bottomed Girls (http://lyrics.astraweb.com/display/0/queen..greatest_hits..fat_bottomed_girls.html)

[Peter Wilson]

Thanks :cool:

[Celestial Mechanic]

Here's two of my personal favorites:

Love Me Two Times by the Doors:
Heard:
Love me two ton girl
Actual:
Love me two times girl

Sisters of the Moon by Fleetwood Mac:
Heard:
And a black widow by day,
Force-fed ham and cheese
Actual:
And a black widow spider makes
More sound than she

[Nicolas]

Not a funny one, but just something I noticed:

Bruce Hornsby and the Range - The Way It Is

All internet sources (which often copy from each other) quote the lyrics as:


They say hey little boy you cant go
Where the others go
cause you dont look like they do
Said hey old man how can you stand
To think that way
Did you really think about it
Before you made the rules
He said, son

I first had the song only on MP3, but I clearly heard

"He said shut up"

I thought that maybe it was MP3 compression. But now I have the 12" vinyl maxisingle, and there too it is very clearly "shut up". I haven't got a lyricssheet with the maxisingle. Because what sometimes happens, is that a web source types over the lyrics as given with the record. But often those are a bit different from what is actually sung in the song. I think the typed lyrics coming with the record are the prepared ones, but that the singer often changes something when recording it.

I also sometimes hear "before you make the rules" instead of "before you made the rules", but that's a subtle difference to hear of course :). I think that he really means to say "made" there, but the articulation of the d is a bit dubious. But the "shut up" can't be a strange pronounciation of "son" :).

[Peter Wilson]

Interesting. I'll have to listen real close next time I hear it.

Remember the song about "Shock the monkey"?

When that RHCP song first came out, I thought he was singing:

Whip the birds [unintelligible] this lonely room

Actual:

With the birds I share this lonely room

[Nicolas]

Thought Elton John was singing: ...And you can tell everyone, this is a song...
Actual: ...And you can tell everyone, this is your song...

No kidding, it's the title of the song :wall: :D

[Parrothead]

Like many others I heard "Sasparilla" by National Velvet as "Sex Gorilla". The band eventually retitled the song because so many people misheard it. :lol:

Same group from the song "Flesh Under Skin", I heard "...I feel lava turn to ice..." as "I feel love turn to ice".

Edit: The songs "Pulling Mussels (from the Shell)" and "Another Nail for my Heart" by Squeeze provided a few misheard lyrics, too.

[Tog]

Oh, from the Gwen Stefani solo album

Heard: "I ain't no Harlem black girl"
Instead of: "I ain't no hollaback girl"

Not that it makes any more sense.

[aurora]

I loved the scene on the bus in Bull Durham where the rookie pitcher was singing about getting wooly (instead of weary).

[Mellow]

You know, Don Mclean was once asked "So, what does American Pie actually mean"
He answered
"it means I never have to work again"

[Sarawak]

Peter Gabriel

Actual: Jeux sans frontieres
Misheard: She's so fun to rape

[closetgeek]

Fear Factory - Martyr
I always heard "Surfer Master"
The real lyrics were "Suffer <child born out of wedlock>

Fear Factory - Lynchpin
I always heard "God give me a pulse"
actual lyrics were "Can't tear me apart"

Billy Idol - Eyes Without a Face
I always heard (despite the title) "How's about a date"

Madonna - Material Girl
I always heard "because the boy with the cold heart cashews always makes delight."
Actual lyrics were "Because the boy with the cold hard cash is always Mr. Right."

[closetgeek]

I can't believe I haven't seen:
Blinded By The Light -
"Wrapped up like a douche another roamer in the night"
"Reved up like a deuce another runner in the night" (actual lyrics)

[Buttercup]

It seems we sometimes hear what we "want to" hear in the lyrics [there's a bathroom on the right//I'm tired of dancing]....sort of like Freudian slips, lol.

[Jens]

I don't know if this qualifies as thread necromancy, but anyway.

This is not entirely my problem, because the original turns out not to be standard English. In the song "Survival" by Bob Marley, I heard the line:

I, I dream, Isis dream.

I was kind of wondering why Isis would come into it, since Marley was a Rastafarian. The real line is:

I idren, I sistren.

"Idren" means "children" or "brethren" in Jamaican, and "sistren" means "sisters."

[DonM435]

Long ago, someone told me of a lovely, traditional ballad, but I couldn't believe the rude name they gave it: The London Derriere.

[AndrewJ]

British indie kids used to debate the first line of the Stone Roses' Fools' Gold as Ian Brown's voice is so light in the mix. The true first line is "The gold road's sure a long road". I used to think he was saying "cocoa shone at Lonrho". Quite.

[redshifter]

Led Zeppelin: Living Loving Maid (She's Just A Woman) lyrics
With a purple umbrella and a fifty cent hat,

What I heard:
With a purple operater and a fifty cent ham

[DonM435]

The oldies station played some obscure Dick Haymes song from the 1940s. My wife and I were puzzling over the oft-repeated refrain.

"Sounds like 'The old mashed p'tatoes,' must be a country song," she guessed.

I noted that I heard it as something even worse.

Turned out it was "The Old Master Painter."

[aastrotech]

Elton John, Rocket Man

Heard; burning down the streets of Avalon

Actual; Turning round the world out here alone

[speedfreek]

Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes:

Actual - "Love lift us up where we belong."

Heard - "The lift goes up when we get on."


Depeche Mode: Enjoy the Silence (2nd verse)

Actual - "Pleasures remain, so does the pain"

Heard - "Pleasure dreaming, soldiers burping"

[Mellow]

"You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille,
With 400 children and a crap in the fields"

[Mellow]

In a similar vein...

"I drove all niiiight, crapped in your room"

[Strange]

Thanks for that. To bring a bit of class to the discussion, I always heard the line "Lei m'intende?" (from the aria "Mi chiamano Mimì" in Puccini's La Boheme) as "Flaming Pansy".

[Solfe]

Somehow I always hear

Hold me close, tiny dancer

as

Hold me close, I'm tired of dancing.

Don't ask me why.

I hear "Hold me closer, Tony Danza."

I am really, really uncomfortable with some of the glitches my brain has.