Terrifel Gruesome.
[slight hijack]
Wait a minute. Herbie Hancock is still giving concerts? Where? When? How much are the ticket? Why wasn’t I told about this …
[/slight hijack]
I love the “triple yeah” and will encourage the use of the “triple yeah” from now on wherever the “triple yeah” might seem appropriate to me. (I used “triple yeah” three times - why, because I’m once, twice, three times a ladaaaaay.")
You either have a tin ear for idiom or people in your locale are using ‘yeah, yeah, yeah’ in a way diametrically opposed to people in the rest of the English-speaking world.
I was once driving cross-country with a classmate, and we’d managed to get on each others’ last nerves by this point in the trip. We were exhausted and cranky and just trying to get through the last day of the drive.
She was driving, and as she came to a stoplight, it was clear she hadn’t noticed it: she wasn’t slowing down at all. “STOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOP!” I said, and she slammed on the brakes without saying a word.
At that point, unfortunately, it occurred to me how ridiculous it was for me to say STOP more than once, and it also seemed hilarious to me (remember the “exhausted” part), and I started giggling helplessly. She just glared ahead, surely thinking murderous thoughts toward her classmate who was laughing at her. I knew that must be what she was thinking, but I was too out of control to explain taht really I was laughing at myself for saying “stop” more than once.
That’s as close as I can come to sympathy for your thread. And classmate, if you’re out there, I’m sorry for my toolish behavior.
Daniel
Koreans, when speaking English, will often repeat “yeah” because it’s common to repeat “yes” (네, 네) in Korean. I try to politely point out to them that it has a different connotation in English.
“Yeah, yeah, (yeah), I’m hip. I’m hip.”
John Mellencamp has also used it.
The version I heard was, “Yeah, yeah.”
Usually attributed to Columbia University philosophy professor Sidney Morgenbesser. 
But… she said she loves you! And you know that can’t be bad.
Yep, with a love like that, you know you should be elated.
I’m glad you don’t listen to LCD Soundsystem.
[Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah… yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah] (x3)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah-yeah, yeah… yeah, hey, hey, hey, hey
Does this mean “The Yeah Yeah Yeahs” and “Yes” have to be the same band?
Nah, I’ve heard it like this, but it’s not said in the same way. “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” usually with a degree of sarcasm, means “I’ve heard it before,” or “I’m not listening to you.” However, “Yeahyeahyeah,” said quickly and with enthusiam can indicate a degree of excitement or being in agreement about something.
FTR, I will sometimes say “yeahyeah,” to agree with something, but the three is more than I can handle 
In Japanese, people will sometimes say “sososo” to indicate that they’ve understood something, usually after that something required further explanation. It can also be accompanied by an “ah.” For example, something like:
Where did you go this weekend?
I went to a concert at X.
At X?
Yeah, right next to Y in F.
Ah, sososo.
I’ve heard upwards of 5 so’s, but usually I hear 3 of them.
guizot, thank you very much. I have heard Korean-born persons do that, and, combined with a general linguistic aggressiveness (I apologize, and I mean no offense, but it seems to my anglo ears that when Koreans speak, *every single syllable * is acutely accented), and my own squeamishness, and Korean names that transliterate as “Kil Yoo,” I now feel as though I have reacted wrongly and badly and unwittingly insulted many nice people. I don’t quite know how to apologize, or to whom, and I’m sorry for that, too.
Awesome–thank you! I heard the story most recently on NPR (probably in his obit), but since I could remember so few of the details, figured it counted as “possbily apocryphal.” That wiki page is hilarious!
Daniel
This came up in another thread. English is stress-timed, but Korean is more or less syllable-timed. It’s not so much that they stress every syllable acutely, but that they stress them evenly–and I guess the strong enunciation is a social thing. A lot of Koreans I know are kind of soft spoken when they talk among themselves. But I know what you mean.
So, do we have to start saying “yadda” instead of yadda, yadda, yadda?
Can we still say “no, no, a thousand times no?”
That’s rather harsh - I’ve heard ‘yeah, yeah, yeah’ used to mean both exasperated boredom with the other speaker, and to communicate emphatic agreement. Some people use it as an agreeable ‘filler’ in conversation.
But it always means something different to ‘yeah’ or ‘yes’, so this is a pointless pitting.