Yeah, I used to think he was saying “I’m an animal.” Van the Man definitely sings with a mouth full of marbles, but he makes it work.
There are sections of Wild Nights where I seriously cannot understand what he was saying at all. I would have to look up the lyrics to tell you what they are. See also: Domino, Caravan, uh…pretty much everything he did, I guess.
One of my favourite Jim Croce songs is Lover’s cross.
Actual lyrics:
*'Cause now it seems that you wanted a martyr
Just a regular guy wouldn’t do
But baby I can’t hang upon no lover’s cross for you *
Which to my bewilderment I had always heard as
*'Cause now it seems that you wanted a mother
Just a regular guy wouldn’t do
But baby I can’t hang upon no lover’s cross for you *
until I finally googled them.
Yeah that makes no sense. Also “another rumor in the night” would have just been a cooler lyric IMO so they should have just owned it.
“Just like the one-winged dove, sings a song sounds like she’s singing…”
“I’m not talking about the linen. And I don’t want to change your life. But theres a warm wind blowin’ and now I’m getting old. And I’d really love to see you tonight” (a 2fer).
“Someone saved my life tonight, should’ve they?” (It’s actually “Sugar bear”. My change is SO much better.)
Was it me? ‘Cause that’s what I’ve always heard!
AnnieXmas, until this moment I thought that Stones line was “They think of you.”
Especially since he’s retiring this week, we really should cite Cecil’s classic columnwhen discussing the lyrics to “Blinded by the Light.” The response to a reader’s letter sort of set the tone for how we often deal with nitpickers on these boards. 
I always heard the chorus of The Lion Sleeps Tonight as “a wiener whack a wiener whack a wiener whack a wiener whack…”
I agree with the Blinded By The Light comments. I always heard “Wrapped up like a douche…”
Not nearly as interesting as “Dirty Deeds and they’re done with Sheep”
Right Hal?
It’s been in maybe the last year or two that I finally realized that in Stairway to Heaven he’s not saying:
And there’s a wino down the road
He’s really saying:
And as we wind on down the road
Wow! You learn something new everyday.
I recall back in the 90s, there was a parody version of this song about Lorena Bobbitt and the chorus was “weiner whacker weiner whacker…”
I once won $50 of free beer by identifying the next line in the song in a bar trivia game, one of the proudest moments of my nerd life.
I heard the right words, I just heard them…differently.
“shoo the children”, as in, get outta here, ya kids
“How’s the people living in the streets?” Eh, not too bad, considering.
Some of mine over the years, in chronological order:
I thought the Monkees were “the Umpteration”, rather than “the young generation”. Comes from only hearing it on the crappy speaker in the TV. And being 8.
I thought Bowie was singing “Bang” instead of “Fame”. I never heard anyone say the title, never had the record in my hands. But I did get a serious ration of shit for it, and deservedly so.
Head East to me has always sung “Woman with a sweet lovin’ better than a white lie”. Comparing a woman’s sexual prowess to a line of coke doesn’t make much more sense than my comparison, and neither word rhymes with “time”.
Cream wanting to give the woman a “dull surprise” is much more poetic than the somewhat crass “dawn surprise”, and so it shall remain in my mind.
And the Bee Gees have always been singing about the “Four-level woman”, who is indeed “more than a woman” to me.
“Line” is a slant-rhyme with “Time”. “Lie” just doesn’t rhyme with it.
Also, singing about white lines is always more interesting than a lie - but nobody will top Joni Mitchell’s “prisoner of the white lines on the freeway” in Coyote in that department.
I mishear a lot of them, but the only ones that amuse me are:
“Tennis Court” by Lorde: “It’s a new [del]art form[/del] iPhone showing people how little we care (yeah!)”
“Walking on a Dream” by Empire of the Sun: “[del]Is it real now[/del] It’s a grandma / [del]When two people become one[/del] Too airborne to come home”
This song by Gomez; why is he singing about cat food? Sounds to me like “Oh cat food, cat food. Oh Let’s drink cat food.” Jump to about :30.
Hee, that one went:
"In the bedroom, the mighty bedroom
John Bobbitt sleeps tonight
In the kitchen, the quiet kitchen
Lorena grabs a knife
A weenie-whack, a weenie-whack…"
Anyway, my contribution is “Memories” by Elvis Presley.
Real words:
“Memories
Of holding hands and red bouquets”
What I hear:
“Memories
Of holding hands and rat bouquets”
I just remembered one I had wrong for quite a long time: the song I thought was Aerosmith’s Doin’ It Like A Lady. 
HAHAHAHA!!
Funniest one I’ve read in a long time was “Let me take French”. Red Rider: Lunatic Fringe. 
Like, why?? “Let me take French / I know you’re out there” ???