Dept. of Misheard Lyrics

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,BrvHrt46
Date: 01 Jan 18 - 10:21 PM

For ages, whenever I heard the line after "Long Tall Sally she's built for speed", I misheard it as "she's got everything that Arkansas need", instead of "she's got everything that Uncle John need". Hey, it could work! : )

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: oldhippie
Date: 01 Jan 18 - 06:01 PM

Sheryl Crow: "All I Wanna Do is Hooked on Phonics"

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,gutcher
Date: 30 Dec 17 - 08:12 PM

Brother-inlaw and Wife had as a houseguest [ludger] a French girl doing her years residence over here in order to teach English on her return home---she returned home speaking our broad Ayrshire tongue--not much use for a teacher of English!.
When settled in back in France she invited my relations over for a holiday.
BiL bought a record on a visit to the town.
    They sat down to tea in the garden BiL placed record on an empty
    seat next to him--out comes young sister of their friend who then
    sat down on the record which of course broke with a loud noise.
BiL in broad Ayrshire accent "It"s a peety" [it"s a pity]
    young girl turns bright red--older sister rolling on the grass
    laughing.
    When she recovered she explained that her sister thought he had
    said in French "Set a pi-pi" [excuse my French] "It"s a fart".

Not a lyric but a true example of crossed wires.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 Dec 17 - 03:35 PM

In the paper today, there's a letter from a granny who says her 6yr old granddaughter was singing Silent Night in the back seat of the car. She ended with the line, "Sleep in heaven, you pigs... Sleep in heaven you pigs."

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: keberoxu
Date: 29 Dec 17 - 03:26 PM

The first time I heard AC/DC sing "Dirty Deeds,"

I remember wondering
what a Dundercheep was.

Dirty Deeds and a Dundercheep . . .

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,trad junkie
Date: 29 Dec 17 - 01:13 PM

How about the young lad many years ago who sang Poor Ditching Boy with the chorus
'With her scheming idle ways she left me for an oaf!'
Seeing him try to rhyme oaf and blood was frightening.
happy days

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Tony Rees
Date: 28 Dec 17 - 04:56 PM

I know this is an old thread, but I was recently tickled by hearing a lady on the radio saying that as a girl, she would ask her dad to sing the song about the ants. "You know: the ants are my friends, they're blowing in the wind..." Seems she was not alone, see here: https://www.amazon.com/Ants-Are-Friends-Celebration-Linguistic/dp/B008SMO3T6

- Tony

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 10 Aug 05 - 09:43 AM

The Pink Airplane! See, she predates pyschedalia.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 10 Aug 05 - 09:07 AM

Also in French: I have heard tell of a request for Edith Piaf's song about the pink airplane (l'avion rose).

--- Joe Fineman    [e-mail]

||: Dying isn't so bad. It's being buried that gets you down. :||

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 09 Aug 05 - 04:55 PM

OK, and one that happens to be in French: In Sarah Sarah, where the family is lamenting that the eldest daughter has gone away to the States and they are bereft, there is a verse where they are gathered around the table and her place is empty. But the first oh, 30 years I heard this song, I heard it as "tous accablés les soirs d'hiver, lorsqu'un par un Mamie nous sert" (all burdened on winter evenings as Mama serves us one by one" - then I got it on CD and it turns out to be "tous aTTablés" - all sitting around the table, not all burdened. In my visual, thanks to the rest of that line, I already had them sitting around the table, but they were all bowed down with their burden of grief. Now that I hear the correct line, they are all still around the table BUT they are sitting up straight!

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 09 Aug 05 - 04:46 PM

I always wondered what tweeping was - "and thou, false love, will tweep for me" - turns out I wasn't listening in Old Enough English, and thou, false love, wilt weep for me is more like it.

And while it isn't a misheard lyric, when in The Rising Of The Moon "out of many a mud-walled cabin eyes were watching through the night" always brought up the visual of cabins covered in mud, with eyes in the cabin walls. Looking through the mud kind of like Rambo.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Aug 05 - 04:56 AM

So as our overseas friends get the picture, the River Tees was one of those rivers in the North East of England ( which is definitely NOT noted for warm weather ) which, by the 1950's was heavily polluted from at least 100 years of uncontrolled steel and chemicals ndustrial usage .
Vin Garbutt wrote a song " the Valley of Tees " .
Harking back to when it must once have been a clean normal river with salmon he began " Pink dorsal fins swam in the clear crystal Tees ........"

A good mate of his and mine, Plonk Inlgedew learned the song and on his first public rendition began " Pink dolphins once swam in the clear crystal Tees ........"

Wow - we p8ssed ourselves laughing , but the unwitting Plonk needed to have it explained to him - and blamed Vins poor diction in the rendering of the song on his first LP.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Snuffy
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 08:05 PM

Look on this thread Shelmalier ?? to find out where Shelmalier is

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Folkiedave
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 05:22 PM

Shelmalier=cavalier (I think)

Dave

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Highlandman
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 05:13 PM

Great post, MMud. As to the throttle bit -- from what I recall of sitting in cabs of some museum queens, the reverse lever on a steam locomotive is completely separate from the throttle: to apply power in reverse requires you to throw the reverse lever AND open the throttle. So if he was pulling the desperation move of reversing power, as the investigators apparently were convinced, he would have had the throttle open. Not likely that he was still in position with his hand on the thing, though... I agree, a bit of heroic-sounding poetic license but with some basis in reality.
-HM, fellow steam buff

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: MissouriMud
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 04:22 PM

With respect to the Wreck of Old 97 - I agree that "Lost his airbrakes" is more likely than "Lost his average" - Trainmen do talk about "losing their air" in certain situations, although normally they have ways to recover it. The lyics were supposedly by a rairoad telegrapher who knew a little about Westinghouse train brake systems. Coming down a three mile grade an engineer trying to push the envelope could easily have made multiple brake applications and releases, without there being suffient time for the brake pressure to recover in between, resulting in what railroaders call "pissing away his air" - a situation where at a certain point the brake reservoir and brake lines no longer have enough air to permit a normal service application (or even to trigger the emergency reservoir, but I dont know if they had emergency reservoirs in 1903). "Lost his airbrakes" was probably more aceptable a lyric than "pissed away his air" and the writer may well have been trying to get across a concept that the public would understand rather than rely on technical railroad terminology in any event. Westinghouse patented the modern train airbrake in 1872 but it was not used universally in the US until 1900 when mandated by the federal Safety Appliance Act - and the systems were still pretty crude so as of 1903 many engineers were still not experts at all the ins and outs of what could go wrong with the systems .

Having his hand on the throttle is an interesting concept - as the throttle is a lever that stays put once you have set it - supposedly he did throw the engine into reverse, but that is done with a different lever. So what was he trying to do with the throttle - throttle up or down? At any rate a lot of engineers keep a hand on the throttle as a "default position" in case an adjustment is needed - you got to put your hand somewhere. Most engineers involved in accidents try to find some sort of position of safety - not that there really is one - like on the floor, or take some sort of protective position , in the final seconds when it becomes apparant that no further action can change the situation. This may well be a little poetic license. The newspaper articles of the wreck while pretty graphic about the scalded to death part do not mention the throttle bit. About the most specific description of body positions was the statement in the Raleigh News and Observer that "the bodies of all those killed were found in the wreckage of the different cars to which they belonged". The writer may well have just been trying to make "Steve" (actually JA Broady) seem particularly heroic by having him maintaining his post to the bitter end, like the captain of the titanic if was portrayed as having his hand still on the wheel

The song has plenty of factual inaccuracies that make for good drama - for example 90 miles an hour sounds a lot more exciting than the 30 to 35 mp reported by the eye witnesses.   Interestingly although half the crew was killed and nearly all the freight was demolished, 6 crates of canaries were unharmed.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Tannywheeler
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 02:52 PM

As a widdle kid this happened to me: The Clancy Bros (at first just Paddy and Tom) were friends and sang a song about a guy named Kelly, who was a bold light-fixture. (We had a chandelier in the area of the living room where my mother had placed the formal dining table. I knew what that was.) I heard "...oh, me bold chandelier, wi' yer long-barreled guns of the sea...", so that's what I sang. It was a while before anyone explained about the place in Ireland, Chelmalye(sp?), and a Chelmalier being (in this case a rebel) from there.    Tw

Subject: RE: Misspoken, misheard, but accepted.
From: Highlandman
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 02:16 PM

"Lost his airbrakes" makes no sense at all. A train's brakes are "deadman brakes"--that is, if you lose the air, the brakes come on; they are held off from application by the air. So unless you think that the application of brakes caused the accident, it wouldn't be "lost his airbrakes".
Uncle DaveO, highway truck brakes are true deadman brakes - mechanically applied by a spring, released by air. Train brakes aren't.
The brakes on a train (improved since the 1903 wreck of the '97 but still work about the same way) use air to apply the brakes and to release. There's an emergency reservoir that holds the air needed to apply the brake if the valve detects that the air pipe has broken. But if the engineer has overused the brakes, consuming more air than the compressor in the locomotive can replace, the whole system bleeds down and - for a while, until the system recovers - you don't get adequate braking force. No big deal unless you happen to be coming up too fast on a sharp curve...
Another thing -- I had long wondered why on earth did he have his "hand on the throttle" if he was trying to slow down? It turns out that railroad people investigating the wreckage found that he had thrown the loco into full reverse, a desperation move that didn't work.
"Lost his averages?" Man, that's really stretching the limits of the language. Someone's poetic license ought to have been revoked for that.
Cheers
-HM

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Nick
Date: 08 Aug 05 - 05:35 AM

There is a line in Paul Simon's Graceland which has always sounded to me like

"The way she brushed her hair and farted"

the actual verse actually being:

"She comes back to tell me she's gone
As if I didn't know that
As if I didn't know my own bed
As if I'd never noticed
The way she brushed her hair from her forehead"

On paper it's nothing like it but on the record...

At the risk of thread creeping there is a line in "The Town I Loved So Well" which I find hard to sing with a straight face -

"There was music there in the derriere"...

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 07:59 PM

Alder & Elder are almost the same if you look far back enough in English from an earlier period.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 04:28 PM

Not a lyric, but for years I thought that Steel Eye Span was the Steel Ice Band. Why not?

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 11:05 AM

Don't see why aldermen won't work, Christ wasn't discoursing with nobodies in the Temple. They were the most learned men in the region, as well as being important figures in the community.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Joe_F
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 10:45 AM

I may have mentioned this on another thread, but here is a curious case where I am still unsure whether the mishearing is mine or someone else's. On recordings, I had always heard the second stanza of Ewan MacColl's "Ballad of the Carpenter" as

When Jesus was a little lad,

The streets rang with his name,

For he argued with the older men,

And he put them all to shame.

A few years ago I noticed that in _The Coffee House Song Book_ "older men" appeared as "aldermen". In MacColl's dialect the pronunciation is probably about the same, and I thought the substitution hilarious. (Hanging around City Hall at a tender age! No wonder he came to a bad end!) But then along came _The Essential Ewan MacColl Song Book_, edited by no less a person than Peggy Seeger, and it has "aldermen" too. It seems presumptuous to suspect her of mondegreening her husband. But I cannot find any definition in the OED that fits the story (Luke 2:46-49); the men he argued with are called "doctors" in the KJV, that is, teachers, that is (in context) rabbis. On the other hand, the OED has not caught up with the U.S. meaning of "alderman", so perhaps it is missing something else. I remain full of doubts.

--- Joe Fineman    [e-mail]

||: Eating beef is the second most overrated pleasure in America. :||

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Flash Company
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 10:36 AM

This is probably thread creep, but in the same vein.
Sheila and I were visiting a stately home in Norfolk (I Think), and the guide drew attention to a porcelain swan, manufactured by the Meissen factory. On the same table were two little , cheap, pottery figures of Jerry (of Tom and Jerry) and Speedy Gonzales.
Someone asked about them, and the guide explained that the owner had found her small grand-daughter searching round the table one day, and when she asked what she was looking for, she said 'The Mice'.
'I heard Mrs Walker telling some visitors to make sure they saw the mice and swan. I can see the swan but where are the mice?'
Naturally, they appeared the next day!

FC

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Mo the caller
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 10:02 AM

As a child I used to wonder where Plicity was and what they did to mice there - "Gentle Jesus Meek and Mild.....Pity my simplicity" (well,yes).
And my family always mock me by singing "chicken on the loose tonight" but I still dont know what the origional words mean ("shaking on the loose" is it? from some pop song from the a few years back)

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: JJ
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 09:24 AM

Bruce Springsteen's "deuce" is the same vehicle as the Beach Boys' "Little Deuce Coupe." I believe this is slang for a '32 Ford.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Azizi
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 09:19 AM

I have to confess that I never have heard the Purple Haze song by Jimi Hendrix-or any other music by Jimi Hendrix. I know that's blasphemy but at least I'm being real and I'll remedy that post haste [not the being realness- I meant the not hearing Jimi Hendrix's music part].

Anyway, in case there might be a few others here who don't know the real lyrics to Hendrix's "Purple Haze", here they are from that kisstheguy.com website whose link I provided above [and that website is also mentioned earlier upthread by the way]

Quoting from that site:

The real lyrics were:
'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky

But I misheard them as:
'Scuse me, while I kiss this guy.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 09:00 AM

In All I Want Is A Room Somewhere, I always hear the line, ' Oh wooden tit be lovely '

eric

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 07 Aug 05 - 07:30 AM

First time I heard "Famous Flower of Serving Men" I thought Martin Carthy was singing "a fish shall do me deadly harm"!!

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Azizi
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 12:18 PM

And yes, I know I have a few typos and grammatical errors in my last post...Sorry.

And yes, I know that I promised to use the preview feature, but darn if I know why I just don't want to take the time to read what I write..

I think if I did, I wouldn't submit most of the posts I write..

which might be a good thing...

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Azizi
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 12:12 PM

And btw, I don't want to open up a can of worms or anything, but is there any difference between 'folk etymology' and mondegreens?

I suppose the folk process can be said to occur if someone consciously or unconsciously changes words or phrases in a song.
And I suppose that mondegreen are words that are accidently misheard.

Is that the difference-words changed on purpose vs words changed accidently and if so words changed on purpose wouldn't be called mondegreens, right?

I'm confusing myself...

Let me give you two examples from my favorite category of folk music: children's rhymes.

One of the few African songs taught in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania public schools is the Ghanaian game song "Kye Kye Kule" {pronounced Chay Chay Koo-lay}

The words to that call & response song are usually given soemthing like this:

Che che kole
che che kole
Che che kofi sa
Che che kofi sa
Kofi sa langa
Kofi sa langa
langa shi langa
langa shi langa   
Koom ma den day
koom ma den day
[often with the added Americanism "Hey!"}

-snip-

In the mid i990s, I collected this foot stomping cheer from my daughter's memory of African American girls [around 6-12 years old]chants in a Pittsburgh summer camp where she worked [in the early 1990s}:

Soloist #1        Jay Jay Kukalay
Group                Jay Jay Kukalay
Soloist #1        Salesah lahndah
Group                Salesah lahndah
Soloist #1        Step back, Shalanda [or "back, back Shalonda"]
Group                Step back, Shalanda
Soloist #1        Oosh, my lover boy!
Group                Oosh, my lover boy!
Soloist #1        I'm callin on,
                I'm callin on
                I'm callin on Rhonda [substitute the name of
                                     next soloist, and repeat entire
                                     cheer]

-snip-

I also collected a version of this foot stomping cheer from a White woman in Pittsburgh who said this was from her memories of the late 1980s when she was growing up in a predominately Black neighborhood in Washington, DC. BTW, my 'informant' wrote the title of the
cheer as "J.J. Cool Aid". IMO, since this is cheer comes
from the oral tradition, it also could have been written "J.J. KoolAid"..and that spelling would have given it a different connotation.

The words to "J.J. Cool Aid" as I was given them are:
Soloist #1        J.J. Cool Aid
Group                J.J. Cool Aid
Soloist #1        Teresa Londa
Group                Teresa Londa
Soloist #1        Back, back Tuanda *
                Whose my lover boy?
                I said mmm my sweetie cakes
                I'm callin on
                I'm callin on
                I'm callin on
                Shakera *

* I think "Tunada" is supposed to be a personal name like "Towanda". "Shakira" is a personal name and is probably the name of the next soloist.

****

My question is this: Is Jay Jay Kukalay, and "J.J. Cool Aid" a mondegreen, an example of folk etymology, both, or something else-and what is this "something else"?

Thanks in advance.


Azizi Powell

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Amergin
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 12:07 PM

A couple of years ago I was at the bar during a break at an Andy M. Stewart Concert....A woman went up to Andy and they were talking about a song he did during the first set...it was Gallant Murray....She asked him what the significance of the white rose...and he explained it was a symbol of the Jacobites....then she asked why would they wear them in their bottom? He looked at her stunned for a moment and then started laughing....and he explained the line is white rose in his BONNET. Needless to say he got a few good laughs when he went back on the stage.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,countess richard sans cookie
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 11:50 AM

Excuse me while I kiss this guy

. . . is what someone thought Jimi Hendrix sang in Purple Haze. Interestingly, I just heard on a radio programme that he got himself discharged from the US army just in time to avoid Vietnam by telling his sergeant he was gay.

Subject: RE: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Azizi
Date: 06 Aug 05 - 11:39 AM

Apparently there have been a number of threads on misheard lyrics.
I chose this because I liked the "Dept. of" designation.

While visiting one of my favorite websites, daily kos I came across this exchange:

digging the scene with gasoline

freeway blues check out the San Bernardino boogie
by 88kathy on Fri Aug 5th, 2005 at 11:31:40 PDT

****

ROTFLMAO, I think... (completely off topic)
Now that I can see through my tears of laughter I am going to guess that "digging the scene with gasoline" is a mishearing of the great early 70s song lyric from "Just be Thankful for What you Got" by William deVaughn, which is actually

"digging (on) the scene with a gangsta lean"

Gangsta lean is a way of driving while leaning sharply toward the passenger side of the car. It was considered a very cool, literally laid-back way to drive when cruising down the street with the point of being seen and admired and envied.

It might have an origin from trying to drive down the street trying not to be seen, but I don't know.

If I am right, I hope you will submit "digging the scene with gasoline" to kissthisguy.com, the archive of misheard lyrics.

and I strongly recommend that website to everyone as the perfect pick me up when things look bad and you need a laugh.

"Politics is like driving. To go backward, put it in R. To go forward, put it in D."

by TrueBlueMajority on Fri Aug 5th, 2005 at 14:21:36 PDT

-snip-

The website that was recommended in that second post is HERE

I visited that website and found some of the misheard lyrics rather funny, but I think it helps to know the song...

So can someone tell me what song the misheard lyric "Kiss this guy" came from?

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Genie
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 02:41 AM

Desdemona, what are the real [disturbing] words?

Dave B., what is the real song title?

BTW, another mondgreen website is "amiright.com"

Genie

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Kaleea
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 02:21 AM

Someone actually wrote into the TV guide columnist about the hit TV show Mary Tyler Moore was on & asked why the theme song went: . . .and it's jew girl & you should know it . . ." when it was Rhoda who was jewish, not Mary.

then there was the time that the minister was leading the singing & sang: " . . .consumate me now to thy service, Lord . . .(instead of "consecrate")

and the time the torch singer sang ". . .I'll be feeling you in all the old familiar places . . .I'll be looking for some love, & I'll be feeling you."

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Den at work
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 03:21 PM

I thought it was revved up like a deuce, another runner in the night. Of course there's always

Slow talkin' Walter
the fire engine guy. (smoke on the water)
Den

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Dead Horse
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 03:02 PM

Bob Copper of the Copper Family said that he thought the original lyrics to one of his best & most famous recordings was:-
Here's a Jew, sweet lovely Nancy......

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 01:04 PM

From the chorus of Black and Tans, where the song goes "tell her how the IRa made you run like hell away" - one of my 6-year olds has a kid named Calloway in his class, and he thought this song was about him - you know, Made You Run Like Calloway.

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Steve in Idaho
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 11:52 AM

A week or so ago on Paltalk I sang "The Great American Bum" and was told by a listener that the word "turd" was probably not appropriate in a "G" rated room. The actual words are "and I live like a royal Turk." Cracked me up!!

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Lynn Koch
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 11:03 AM

For more such fun check out www.kissthisguy.com

A professor of mine once told me he spent years wondering why we would pledge allegience "the the republic for Richard Stans."

And what happened to that poor kid who thought, of Sweet Baby James, "Don't you let me go down that drain." (Sung, of course, in the bathtub).

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Jeri
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 10:30 AM

Boab, no, I don't mind you being picky. I thought it should have been "Moray" as well (and it goes better in that parody verse) but the DT has "Murrey."

Someone once told me about playing a gig, when an audience member got quite offended and talked to him after the set. Seemed he'd called out the next tune "Athole" (Highlanders) and the audience member thought he was calling another band member something.

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: mooman
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 10:18 AM

My daughter plays a Lighthouse Family track for which the chorus purports to contain:

"I'm just a lost soul..."

But I can only hear:

"I'm just an arsehole..."!

mooman

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 08:36 AM

I knew a kid when I was in high school who walked around singing, "So long, it's "Fingers" Gunnolia," instead of "So long, it's been good to know ya." I guess he thought it was a song about a mob wipeout. Had a nice ring to it, though..
Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: gnu
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 07:46 AM

Over Christmas, I babysat for friends. Upon reading, "Mares eat oats, and does eat oats..." I was amazed that, for forty years, I thought it was just the garble, "Marsey Dotes, and Dosey Dotes...".

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 04:29 AM

During a singalong of the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers, a friend heard her little son earnestly intoning "Christ the royal master leans against the phone".

Also (can't remember where I heard this) during the Pledge of Allegiance a teacher reported hearing a child recite "one naked individual with liberty & justice..."

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 15 Feb 02 - 03:42 AM

A Glasgow favourite---"In past oor green he leadeth me, the quiet waters by---" And, Jeri---"They hae slain the Earl o' MORAY and laid him on the green...". Hope ye dinna mind Boab bein' "picky"----

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 11:23 PM

Here's the http://www.goatview.com/august19mondegreens.htm link from above. And here is the Google search. It came up with 1,240 hits.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Pene Azul
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 11:21 PM

A few other threads:

any new mondegreens?

Misheard words

Mistakes I Have Made When Listening To Songs

Misspoken, misheard, but accepted. (some lyrics)

Jeff

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: technission
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 11:08 PM

When a / pun hits your thigh/ like a big beastly guy/ that's abhorrent ... I first saw the word Mondegreen on a >ahem< Neil Young site, I think it was Hyperrust. I had to do a bit of searching within that site to ferret out the explanation. I thought I had a number of mondegreen reference sites bookmarked, but all I can find right now is: http://www.goatview.com/august19mondegreens.htm Sorry, I've been waiting for serious boredom to learn how to make a clicky-thing. I think if you search Google with mondegreen you get enough hits to keep you busy for a while...... \8># michael

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Anahootz
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 11:06 PM

I thought the springsteen lyric was "cut loose like a deuce, another roamer in the night".

At any rate, John Prine's "greatest hits" has a song called "that's the way that the world goes 'round" which contains the chorus "...it's a half an inch of water and you think you're going to drown".

While singing the song, he relates a story of a woman who asks him to sing the song about the happy enchilada. He says "I've never written a tune about an enchilada, much less a happy one", to which she replies "oh yes, you say 'it's a happy enchilada and you think you're going to drown'".

Prine says "glad you liked the song, ma'am"

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Jeri
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:46 PM

There's a Bathroom on the Right was another thread we had on the subject. There are a few links in there.

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Jeri
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:43 PM

When a dead Earl is seen
Who gets laid on the green
It's a Murrey...

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:33 PM

BTW, misheard lyrics of this kind are known as "mondegreens", stemming from a Scots ballad someone misheard as saying, "They have slain the Earl of X and Lady Mondegreen", the actual words being "...and laid him on the green".

There is a charming website about these; maybe someone can provide a link. Hours of fun...

Michael

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:28 PM

"Wrapped up like a douche, another runner in the night"???

Actually, Bruce Springsteen's lyric says "deuce" (maybe a gambling reference, or maybe hot-rod cars).

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Jeri
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:27 PM

"Wrapped up like a deuce, another runner in the night," which, I believe is not how Springstein wrote it, which might have been "cut loose like a deuce, another rumor in the night." Of course, now I'm confused, and I might have either or both versions wrong or mixed up. Help.

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Lynn Koch
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:12 PM

This goes a bit beyond misheard lyrics and into the realm of unintelligibility (if there is such a word)...There was an old song by Manfred Mann called "Blinded by the light..." and where does the refrain go from there???

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Justa Picker
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:07 PM

I was absolutely convinced for a long time that the Police tune "Canary In A Coal Mine" was in fact called "Canary In A Coma."

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: GUEST,Annie
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 10:04 PM

Or my girlfriend's favorite Jim Croce song back when we were kids - "If I Could Put Wine In A Bottle" - she was amazed when I told her what the lyrics really were - she said she just couldn't figure out why this guy couldn't put wine in a bottle!

Annie

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 09:55 PM

I suppose these are best if we tell them on ourselves. As a child I heard my father frequently sing the Ezra Pound parody "Winter is Icummen In" and I always wondered why "egg, you hath my ham." Now that I have a master's in English, I've been set straight on the real words (and the professor of medieval stuff who told me nearly fell on the floor laughing at my Dr. Suessian version).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Janie
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 08:46 PM

1. When my son was a toddler he asked who "little Lord Cheeses" was when he heard "Away in a Manger."

2. My sister--(Hope she doesn't read this, she'll kill me for telling) "Ebeneezer Brown, and the sky is gray/ I went for a walk/on a winter's day" (Mammas & Pappas)

Subject: RE: BS: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 07:50 PM

There was an Irishman who used to be a regular at one venue where I sometimes sang. He kept on at me to sing a song about sailing around the coast of Ireland. I insisted that I didn't know such a song, but he said he'd heard me sing it. One day I sang a well known McColl song from "Singing the Fishing". Afterwards the Irishman said "That's the one I've been on at you for - The Shores of Erin".

Doesn't say much for my diction, does it.

Subject: Dept. of Misheard Lyrics
From: Desdemona
Date: 14 Feb 02 - 04:26 PM

I always listen to music in the car, and my kids are probably pretty inured to it at this point, but every so often they surprise me, especially my youngest.

One day on the way home from school, with "Prince Heathen" on the CD player, he says, that's a weird song. "Why?" "I never get to be that dog", he replies,"What's that supposed to mean?"

Now, this child has probably heard that song a million times in his 7 years, and all the time he thought those were the words....! I laughed heartily, but didn't disabuse him of the notion, as the real lyrics are far more disturbing!

Anyone else have similar anecdotes? (NB---this thread IS about music!)

D.