Song Titles or Lyrics that may be heard differently.....

[oldies76]

Sometimes we hear songs and lyrics on the radio and occasionally they may sound differerent to our ears. Let's start with these:


Secret Agent Man - Secret Asian Man
On the Radio - On the Rideo (video)
Carefree Highway - Every Highway

 

[KeithE4]

I think there's an old thread on this subject already, but...

"There's a bathroom on the right" - CCR Bad Moon Rising
"'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" - Jimi Hendrix Purple Haze

 

[cd637299]

I think there's an old thread on this subject already, but...

"There's a bathroom on the right" - CCR Bad Moon Rising
"'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" - Jimi Hendrix Purple Haze

There is already a whole website of these misheard lyrics, under the name of www.kissthisguy.com !

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[rnigma1]

I remember that book of misunderstood lyrics, "Scuse Me While I Kiss This Guy," which probably led to that website. I used to think that Gordon Lightfoot was singing "every highway" too.

Then there are lyrics that were garbled beyond comprehension, e.g., "Don't Pull Your Love" by Hamilton Joe Frank & Reynolds (I recall the MST3K episode wherein the bots were wondering whether HJF&R were two, three or four people - actually, they were three) - the line "cry for 100 years" sounded to me like "high fo hongry gyaay."

 

[EZway2go]

There's a line in "Blessed Are The Believers" by Anne Murray that always sounds to me like "old poppycock." But she's actually singing "cold coffee cup."

 

[deltas69]

Isley Bros...Who's That Lady..I thought for years they were singing OOO Satin Lady...

 

[willdav713]

Sometimes we hear songs and lyrics on the radio and occasionally they may sound differerent to our ears. Let's start with these:


Secret Agent Man - Secret Asian Man
On the Radio - On the Rideo (video)
Carefree Highway - Every Highway

I always got Gordon Lightfoot's Carefree Highway confused with Every Highway.

And Steve Winwood's "Valerie" with "Call On Me"

 

[willdav713]

I think there's an old thread on this subject already, but...

"There's a bathroom on the right" - CCR Bad Moon Rising

Me, too. Except I would sing it like that. Along with the Every Highway.

I had a friend in High School who thought Starship's "We Built this City" was "We built this City on Broadway road." Somewhat near the truth since it being San Antonio and all.

 

[firepoint525]

WAR, "Why Can't We Be Friends?" I always heard "like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass." Hey, I was 11 years old at the time! ;D

 

[willdav713]

WAR, "Why Can't We Be Friends?" I always heard "like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass." Hey, I was 11 years old at the time! ;D

They play that song as much as like a pig eatin' grass, way too many times. Don't get me started with the Eagles. There seems to be a law somewhere that a radio station that is called a rocker has to play the Eagles once every 1 or 2, especially in Houston. The same law applies to WAR's Low Rider, or Why Can't We Be Friends? on the Classic Hits format.

 

[CTListener]

WAR, "Why Can't We Be Friends?" I always heard "like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass, like a pig eatin' grass." Hey, I was 11 years old at the time! ;D

And I heard a line in Michael Murphey's "Wildfire" as "Gonna leave South Boston behind" at the age of 19! The concept of "sod-bustin'" was foreign to this native Bostonian.

 

[Mediaace]

Barry White "You're My First, My Last, My Everything". I would hear the line as: "You're my first, my last, my garlic salt".
Jimmy Buffett - "Margaritaville" I would hear the line as"I blew up my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top. While my foot had to freeze all the way back home". (I was 7- years old when this timeless classic was released).

 

[rnigma1]

In "Abracadabra" I thought Steve Miller sang "black panties with an angel's face." And in the next line I could not tell whether he sang "in your sighs" or "in your thighs."

 

[firepoint525]

Jimmy Buffett - "Margaritaville" I would hear the line as"I blew up my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top. While my foot had to freeze all the way back home". (I was 7- years old when this timeless classic was released).

Actually, I thought he was saying "pop tart" there. But I'm from west Tennessee, where colas are called "Cokes," even if they're Pepsi! The concept of calling it a "pop" was foreign to me. Needless to say, the lyrics made no sense to me!

 

[firepoint525]

And I heard a line in Michael Murphey's "Wildfire" as "Gonna leave South Boston behind" at the age of 19! The concept of "sod-bustin'" was foreign to this native Bostonian.

I could probably write a book about "Wildfire." Dave Barry did, well, sort of. In Dave Barry's Book of Bad Songs, he claims that someone wrote to him claiming that Wildfire died in a "killing frost." While Barry was correct in explaining that a "killing frost" merely ends the growing season, and is not enough to kill a horse, he missed the gender. The lyric was "she died one winter, when there came a killing frost." The horse, however, as we learned elsewhere in the song, was male. Apparently, it was the girl who died during the killing frost, leading me to believe that the killing frost was a coincidence, not the cause of her death. But in the next line, Murphey claimed that the horse was lost in a blizzard! How did we go from a killing frost to a blizzard in just one line? (Maybe it was her ghost who called out for "Wildfire" in the rest of the song. At least Wildfire wasn't "a horse with no name." ;D)

 

[CTListener]

And I heard a line in Michael Murphey's "Wildfire" as "Gonna leave South Boston behind" at the age of 19! The concept of "sod-bustin'" was foreign to this native Bostonian.

I could probably write a book about "Wildfire." Dave Barry did, well, sort of. In Dave Barry's Book of Bad Songs, he claims that someone wrote to him claiming that Wildfire died in a "killing frost." While Barry was correct in explaining that a "killing frost" merely ends the growing season, and is not enough to kill a horse, he missed the gender. The lyric was "she died one winter, when there came a killing frost." The horse, however, as we learned elsewhere in the song, was male. Apparently, it was the girl who died during the killing frost, leading me to believe that the killing frost was a coincidence, not the cause of her death. But in the next line, Murphey claimed that the horse was lost in a blizzard! How did we go from a killing frost to a blizzard in just one line? (Maybe it was her ghost who called out for "Wildfire" in the rest of the song. At least Wildfire wasn't "a horse with no name." ;D)

And in the last verse, you have an ambiguous pronoun: "There's been a hoot owl howlin' outside my window now for six nights in a row / She's coming for me, I know, and on Wildfire we're both gonna go." That "she's" has nothing to refer to but the hoot owl. So does the singer ride off on the horse with the owl perched on his shoulder?

 

[cd637299]

[deleted]

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[unitron]

Jimmy Buffett - "Margaritaville" I would hear the line as"I blew up my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top. While my foot had to freeze all the way back home". (I was 7- years old when this timeless classic was released).

Actually, I thought he was saying "pop tart" there. But I'm from west Tennessee, where colas are called "Cokes," even if they're Pepsi! The concept of calling it a "pop" was foreign to me. Needless to say, the lyrics made no sense to me!

I think pop, short for soda pop, is a northern thing, but Buffet's line had nothing to do with the beverage and everything to do with the container, i.e., a can for which one did not need a can opener or "church key".

I refer you to the country classic "Pop a top".

And it was "blew out my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top, cut my heel, had to cruise on back home"

 

[CTListener]

Jimmy Buffett - "Margaritaville" I would hear the line as"I blew up my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top. While my foot had to freeze all the way back home". (I was 7- years old when this timeless classic was released).

Actually, I thought he was saying "pop tart" there. But I'm from west Tennessee, where colas are called "Cokes," even if they're Pepsi! The concept of calling it a "pop" was foreign to me. Needless to say, the lyrics made no sense to me!

I think pop, short for soda pop, is a northern thing, but Buffet's line had nothing to do with the beverage and everything to do with the container, i.e., a can for which one did not need a can opener or "church key".

I refer you to the country classic "Pop a top".

And it was "blew out my flip-flop, stepped on a pop top, cut my heel, had to cruise on back home"

Correct. And the pop-top cans in both "Margaritaville" and "Pop a Top" were undoubtedly beer cans, not soda cans. However, they were called pop tops to distinguish them not from cans that needed an opener or key but from the first easy-opening beer/soda cans, the pull-tab cans. Those tabs came right off and could actually slice your heel when left on the beach. I believe Buffett sings "bruised my heel," which mans he had stepped on a whole, intact can rather than a sharp-sided tab.

 

[firepoint525]

And in the last verse, you have an ambiguous pronoun: "There's been a hoot owl howlin' outside my window now for six nights in a row / She's coming for me, I know, and on Wildfire we're both gonna go." That "she's" has nothing to refer to but the hoot owl. So does the singer ride off on the horse with the owl perched on his shoulder?

Okay, I am probably overanalyzing this one, but maybe the ghost of that girl is speaking to him through that hoot owl. All I know is that if a hoot owl had howled outside someone's window for six nights in a row down in west Tennessee where I grew up, someone would have shot it by then! ;D

Interesting to note that Michael (Martin) Murphey, by then a country singer, won a grammy for "best new artist" in 1983 on the strength of his 1982 hit, "What's Forever For." Apparently, they had forgotten about "Wildfire" and a couple of other minor hits that he had had in the '70s. (He later went on to sing "western" music. He probably had that subgenre almost entirely to himself!)