[QUOTE=WOOKINPANUB"…but it just may be a LOOOOOnatic you’re lookin’ for"
.[/QUOTE]
But that is the way “lunatic” is supposed to be pronounced. LOO-nah-tick. You have to at least give them the latitude to extend syllables and vowels to fit the song’s music.
Now, if Avril Lavigne had sang that song she would have said “Lee-oo-nah-tick,” which would be bad.
To be accurate, they are from Oakland, which is nowhere near being “suburban”.
I hate to defend Green Day, but some Californians can sound pretty funky. Though most Californians speak network standard, there is a California accent and it can get pretty thick- I know I’ve got one.
It’s not a pronunciation, but a failed attempt to make a lyric fit a melody:
“I - could - not - fore - see - this - thing - hap - pen - ing - to - you - u,” Rolling Stones, “Paint it Black.” Still sucking after 40 years.
Urgh-Snow Patrol and Van Morrison.
There is a reason most Northern Irish people try not to sing with Norn Irn accents.
It is the definitive vowel-mangling accent and when the put-on American accent slips, it just gets nasty.
Fairly becomes Furrly
Head becomes Hey-ad
House becomes Hoy-se
Hours becomes Arrs
Out becomes Oyt
Here become Hee-arr
yuck, yuck, yuck.
In Sublime’s What I Got, you have I think the worst example of this:
Love is what I got
Don’t start a riot
For one thing, it’s a dumb lyric. But then he has to force the pronunciation of riot as “RYE-ot” just to make it fit. Bugs the crap out of me.
I don’t know how much it counts as far as pronounciation, but if it does, I have the winner. Maybe it should win anyway, like an anti-Rio by Duran Duran:
SANTA BABY
Aaargh!
Hey, took Linguistics 101 & 102 with Labov! He also paid me a bit to get samples of my accent.
In any event, I believe the New Orleans accent described is know n as “Yat.”
There’s this TV commercial that adapts “Our House” by Madness, but the new lyrics are so ill-suited that words repeatedly wind up awkwardly hurried or accented on the wrong syllable.
Uggh. You just reminded me of that Applebee’s ad that parodies the Gilligan’s Island theme. They rhyme “skewer” with “three-hour tour [pronounced ‘tewer’].” I know it’s intentionally bad. That doesn’t prevent it from being really annoying. In fact, it might be making it worse.
Well according to John Kennedy Toole (Confederacy of Dunces) people from New Orleans do ideed sound just like people for Jorsy. How sad! (I should say I’m from New Jersey …but I don’t sound like that! I swear!)
Anyway no doubt someone else has made that point and I missed it. My attetion span is not what it should be. If so I apologize. But it’s worth mentioning.
Thank you for the correction. Problem is, I’ve heard Billie Joe interviewed on VH1 or wherever and he talks like someone from Earth, which is not how he sings.
Take a gander at the store
At the present day store
At the mod-ren store
At the present-day, mod-ren
De-part-mentalized
GROC’ry store!
–“Rock Island”, rhythmic recitation from The Music Man (Meredith Willson, 1957)
(The show is supposed to be taking placed in the Midwest in 1912, so maybe people said it there and then, too. Dunno.)
One does if one’s writing music. Frixample, C# may also be “spelled” Db. Same pitch, different roles in theory. You need C# to make the key signature of D; you need Db to make the key signature of Ab.
Except it’s not a forced rhyme for the sake of rhyming; it’s a forced rhyme for humorous effect. The kid’s dad makes an “Oh, you…” gesture at him, the other adults laugh, and the kid smirks as he exits.
[off-topic]What irks me about that scene is when the oldest girl says, “I’d like to stay and taste my first champagne?” and her dad responds with an emphatic “No.” Puh-leaze. She was 16 in 1930s Europe; she would have had her first champagne at 12.[/o-t]
Anyway, irritating pronounciations. “Right Down the Line” by Steely Dan. “Hoo-man” for “woman”? WTF?
Can’t blame Steely Dan for that one; it’s Gerry Rafferty.
I’m a fan, but even I have to admit that she actually deserves some kind of lifetime achievement award for screwy pronunciations in songs.
Maybe she was frightened by a phonetics class at an early age, but sometimes listening to her mangle language is unbearable.
I noticed after this posted that there is no mention of who this is reference to.
As if there could be any doubt: Tori Amos
“And when I get excited my little China Girlsays oh baby just you shut your mouse”
No, no, no. Mr. Roboto is quite clearly a modron!
My vote is a rather obscure one. In the song “Seven Lives” by In Strict Confidence, the singer (whoever he is) bafflingly pronounces “ressurrect” as “RE-surrect.” Like what you’d do if you accidentally “unsurrected” something and wanted it surrected again.
He also rhymes it with “neck,” but that kind of works.
That’s the way I pronounce ‘riot’. How do you say it?
James Reyne, ex lead singer of Australian Crawl, has the be the king of this. Some samples:
Things Don’t Seem
(universally known as “The Transistor Song” because the first line sounds so much like “Transistor”)
THAAAANGS justa
DOWWWN’T seema
Ter be QUAHT RAHT
<etc>
Indisposed
Wanna tell you 'bout my frienda
He got hit by a fender
But he’ll soon be on the menda
He’s of the male gender
Glad to see that he’s on his way
He’s not for burial today
Because he’s in… he’s indesPOWsed
Because he’s in yeah yeah… he’s indesPOWsed
Found him outside the dry cleaners
Oh the driver’s misdemeanors
I’ve never seen a face so greena
He looks a like the cats dinner
<etc>