Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer” was on the radio this morning. Every time I hear it it reminds me of when I was a kid, because for the longest time I was positive he was saying:
“Hold me closer, Tony Daaaanzaaaa…”
What are some lyrics you heard differently from what they were?
There is a line in “Do you Feel Like We Do” that I’m not sure anybody but Frampton knows.
*Champagne for breakfast and a sherman in my hand
***** top, ***** tails - never fails
Or
“Peached up peached ale, never fails”
*
I’ve listened to it hundreds of times and have no idea what he is saying.
The other one that drives my crazy is VH Ice Cream Man.
The classic misheard lyric is , of course, from Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze: "Excuse me while I kiss this guy’ instead of “Excuse me while I kiss the sky”.
For a long time I beleved that Mick Jagger was singing “I’ve got satin shoes and (some brand name I didn’t know) boots” at the beginning of Can’t You Hear Me Knocking instead of sad shoes and nasty boots.
Not having had much religious education in my youth, I originally though the chorus in Kyrie Eleison by Mr. Mister was “Carry a laser down the path that I must travel.”
There’s a song that plays on our music system at work that I misheard for days before I finally went to the backroom and looked at the readout on the unit. I couldn’t figure out why the guy was singing “It’s all about the workplace”. He wasn’t. He was singing “It’s all about the wordplay”. Jason Mraz, I think.
My coworker got ticked the day the Shame song came on…she said, “I just don’t understand why they keep singing Shame, shame, shame…” It was “Chain, chain, chain, chain of fools.”
In the Who’s Substitute, before learning the name of the song, I thought they were singing “silk stitch shirts” As soon as I gave any consideration to the lyrics, I realized I was wrong. When I finally heard the title, I felt like an idiot. Still do, as a matter of fact.
For years I simply heard a garbled line in the Laura Nyro-written/Three Dog Night hit version of Eli’s Comin’ Finally I discovered the line I couldn’t understand was
“I walked to Apollo by the Bay.”
Only problem is, I still have no idea what the hell they’re talking about. Whenever I Google “Apollo by the Bay” I simply get a link to the song lyrics.
Those both happen to be the names of movie theatres in both Seattle and San francisco, or were. I have no idea if that’s what the lyric was referring to though.
Aha, Pink Floyd must’ve done the cover on that one. “I got nicotine stains on my fingers, and the inevitable piano mall buds, all down the funt and my finger in satin shoes”
not to mention “Got a pair of go hell boots and I got my finger on my roots”
All my childhood I thought Silent Night has: round, young virgin
little did I know then that now that I’m middle-aged, the only guys who are interested in me are round, young virgins
A friend of mine (no really… not me at all!) used to think that the Kiss song “Rock and Roll All Night” went: I wanna rock and roll all night, and part of every day. (Instead of party every day.)
Frankly, now that we’re over 30, this seems much more doable.