It’s not ‘crew’? Huh.
Even now that I know better, I still hear the inimitable Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull telling me the train “won’t stop going but it could slow down”.
(“no way to slow down”)
I am reminded of when I was young and my aunt loved Eric Carmen’s All By Myself. One day she was singing along to it and my little pre-adolescent self innocently asked, “Doesn’t he say he DON’T wanna be all by himself?”
All that time she thought he sang, 'I wanna be all by myself". I distinctly remember because she got mad at me and denied it but had to apologize to me later when it turned out I was right. She was going through a really bad break up at the time. Really, really bad.
Martin Page “House of Stone and Light” - still not sure I fully grok all of the lyrics (generally about enlightenment hoped for from beyond the grave -?), but I heard the words as “house of stone and ‘lime’”, figuring it to be some sort of ancient burial preparation. But I just now looked up the correct lyrics, and “light” it is.
I shared her mondegreen for decades before hearing it somewhere and paying close attention to the lyrics. I agree that it would be far more poignant and less pat and cliched her way.
Funny remembrance sparked while watching the latest Ken Burns documentary: I misheard Steve Miller’s chant of “Stand back!” from Living In the USA as “Stamp Act!”
The new John Prine tribute concert documentary prompted me to rehear Bette Midler’s 1972 version of his 1971 song “Hello in There.” My parents played Bette’s LP a lot when I was around seven or eight years old (that is, around 1977-78). I remember thinking about the line “and we lost baby in the Korean War…” I was old enough to get how it the song was a wistful reminiscence by an elderly couple, and even at that age I knew enough history* to see that the timing was right (old folks around 65 would have been 45 circa 1950, their youngest kid in his early twenties…) — and, I thought it was interesting they still recalled their child as “Baby,” which (to me) made the loss even more poignant.
Minutes ago, I read the lyrics. It’s “Davy,” not “Baby.”
Still one of the more poignant songs ever, but just a little less so.
(Note how Prine was 22 when he wrote it. Impressive – even more than Simon and Garfunkel being 27 when their album Bookends was made, which also has several songs from old people’s perspective).
(*Thank you, Best of Life!)