# Not just a Mondegreen: The Wrong Artist! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 15, 2011, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565 "2011-06-15T14:45:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/21 "2011-06-15T20:45:38Z")
For ages, I thought “Machine Gun” by the Commodores was done by Billy Preston. ---
**Author:** ![Dogzilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@Dogzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogzilla)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/22 "2011-06-15T20:53:14Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > You’re thinking of the “I’m a creep, i’m a weirdo” _Creep_. STP did the “takes time with a wounded hand, cause he likes to heal” _Creep_. :smack: Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/23 "2011-06-15T21:53:47Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Thanks to early exposure to the Muppet Show, I spent YEARS thinking “Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song” was actually recorded by Paul Williams instead of Three Dog Night. > > And I’m still mightily confused about which 70s releases were by Paul McCartney and which were by Paul McCartney and Wings. He did write it. I think you can be forgiven though; until your post I had no idea that Three Dog Night did songs that _weren’t_ covers. ---
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/24 "2011-06-16T03:37:08Z")
For years I wondered who did a song I like. I didn’t know the name or the artist, but I could have sworn it was done by Bryan Adams. Nope, just a few years ago I learned it’s called “The Breakup Song” by the **Greg Kihn Band**. And this will sound silly, but for the longest time I always wondered if “Peace Train” was sung by Burgess Meredith. I mean, I was familiar with Cat Stevens, but for years had no idea he was the one who sang that song. ---
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/25 "2011-06-16T03:50:04Z")
Another convincing entrant in the Elvis ripoff stakes was Conway Twitty’s [“It’s Only Make Believe”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uun5aF78Kts&feature=related). For years I assumed the mid70s hit “Right Back Where We Started From” was by the Captain and Tenille. It’s a bouncy piano song with a female voice so you can see why I thought it. [Turns out it wasn’t.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBjp6SBmOJ8) ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/26 "2011-06-16T08:26:40Z")
Going back to the OP, the Hollies are probably the hardest band in history to remember which are their songs. They’ve lasted an amazingly long time. They were formed in 1962 and are still touring and recording (but no longer charting) with two of the musicians who aren’t quite original members but who joined in 1963. During that time they’ve managed to sound like everybody else who ever slightly influenced them. It would be easy to dismiss them as copycats with no original ideas of their own, but the fact is that they are a good band with a lot of interesting hits which don’t all fit in any easily remembered genre. ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/27 "2011-06-16T13:52:08Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Going back to the OP, the Hollies are probably the hardest band in history to remember which are their songs. They’ve lasted an amazingly long time. They were formed in 1962 and are still touring and recording (but no longer charting) with two of the musicians who aren’t quite original members but who joined in 1963. During that time they’ve managed to sound like everybody else who ever slightly influenced them. It would be easy to dismiss them as copycats with no original ideas of their own, but the fact is that they are a good band with a lot of interesting hits which don’t all fit in any easily remembered genre. Thanks so much. This makes me feel a little less an idiot. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/28 "2011-06-17T09:44:38Z")
Going back to post #13, what you’ve got to remember is that Kenny Rogers wasn’t at all the grizzled old country star he is today when that song came out. Here’s a clip from _The Smothers Brothers Show_ with him and his band doing the song: [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/yZ8k6fVe25k/hqdefault.jpg "Kenny Rogers & The First Edition - Just Dropped In") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ8k6fVe25k) You can see from the way the show has set up the stage and added special effects what image they want to give for them. The band in this clip has a post-British-Invasion, pre-Acid-Rock look. Everybody’s hair is modishly long, the clothes are consciously hip (for that time), and both the music and the special effects are implying that everybody associated with the band and the show had just dropped some acid. Kenny Rogers has had a weird musical history: > **[Kenny Rogers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenny_Rogers)** > > Kenneth Ray Rogers (August 21, 1938 – March 20, 2020) was an American singer and songwriter. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2013. Rogers was particularly popular with country audiences but also charted more than 120 hit singles across various genres, topping the country and pop album charts for more than 200 individual weeks in the United States alone. He sold more than 100 million records worldwide during his lifetime, making him one of the best-selling music artists o... He did doo-wop, then jazz, then folk, then acid rock, then a long stretch in middle-of-the-road country, then jazz again, then country versions of Christmas and gospel songs. ---
**Author:** ![Lilacs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Lilacs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lilacs)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/29 "2011-06-17T11:43:56Z")
Continuing with the Hollies: When I heard “Look Through Any Window” I thought it was The Beatles. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/30 "2011-06-17T12:15:27Z")
For me it’s the Go-Betweens [“Streets Of Your Town”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XDmasbARtE). I only knew it from the radio and always thought it was by Prefab Sprout. Years after first hearing the song, a coworker lent me “16 Lovers Lane”, and I saw my mistake. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/31 "2011-06-17T12:59:51Z")
I thought that “[Lightning Strikes](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyRqdzF8swY)” by Lou Christie was by the Four Seasons or at least a Frankie Valli solo. I think the switch to falsetto fooled me. ---
**Author:** ![cjepson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a9adbd/32.png) [@cjepson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cjepson)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/32 "2011-06-17T15:11:33Z")
> [@Snickers](#): > > “Stuck in the Middle with You” is so totally the Beatles. You think so? Back in the day it was generally referred to as “the best song Bob Dylan never did.” My entry: “Rescue Me”, which I only recently learned was not by Aretha Franklin, but Fontella Bass. I also used to think that the Byrds’ version of “You Ain’t Going Nowhere” was by the Grateful Dead, but that was long ago. (I think it was the pedal steel that fooled me.) ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/33 "2011-06-17T15:36:14Z")
**cjepson** , your thing about _“Stuck in the Middle with You”_ and not-Dylan helped me remember a [Not Sousa March](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpRwpJUBQAE) ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/34 "2011-06-17T18:57:45Z")
I consistently have trouble remembering which band did which song in the combined catalogs of **Foreigner** and **Journey**. It totally doesn’t help that the two bands both rock, and have frequently toured together and presumably cover each other’s songs in such concerts. Can you group this list of songs by band? Unfortunately in this case, YouTube videos like this always label the artist, but see how you do if you close your eyes after clicking. “[Cold As Ice](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGrRXOZpQWw)” “[Separate Ways](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIr7AxzCRmU)” “[Don’t Stop Believin’](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlzWbZ3GfMo)” “[Juke Box Hero](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlAe77E3gxY)” “[Urgent](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRf8VV_iIwo)” “[I Want To Know What Love Is](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUYGzZ0tQpA)” “[Wheel In The Sky](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/wheel%20in%20the%20sky%20with%20lyrics)” “[Any Way You Want It](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BwClieXpLU)” ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/35 "2011-06-17T19:42:36Z")
What? No mention of Neil Young’s “A Horse With No Name?” ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/36 "2011-06-17T19:53:51Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > What? No mention of Neil Young’s “A Horse With No Name?” But Neil Young’s horse is named Crazy. I thought everybody knew that. So there’s no way he’d ever sing about a “horse with no name”. ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2011, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565/37 "2011-06-17T20:20:54Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > But Neil Young’s horse is named Crazy. I thought everybody knew that. So there’s no way he’d ever sing about a “horse with no name”. Side-track: Richard III might have had a name with no horse. ☹ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/not-just-a-mondegreen-the-wrong-artist/585565.md?page=1)