YOUR misheard lyrics

Cafe Society
141

This one’s not as interesting as some, but Heart’s Crazy On You has a verse:

I was a willow last night in a dream
I bent down over a clear running stream
**Singing a song **that I heard up above…

Now, there’s nothing wrong with that lyric. Except, I wondered why Ann pronounced it “sangin’ a song”. Is that some regionalism? I saw them in concert last week, and after 40 years she’s still pronouncing it “sangin’”.

Nearly 40 years on, and I FINALLY find out she’s been singing (er…sanging) “I sang you a song…” all this time.

Also~

England Dan &JFC is:

I’m not talkin’ 'bout millenium,

Everyone know this!

142

The first several times I heard it blasting from a stereo in my college dorm, I thought the lyric was “Indian” (actually “India-a-a-an love song”). Since I knew courtesy of Charlie Daniels that the “Tucker boys (were) singin’ down in Caroline”, I figured the MTB song must have been referring to some lovelorn North Carolina Cherokee.

143

Maybe that’s where the moneychangers set up after he chased them out of the temple.

144

Rod Stewart - “Maggie May”

Actual lyrics:

Or steal my daddy’s cue and make a living out of playing pool

For a while I heard it as:

Or steal my daddy’s cue and make a living out of playing fool

145

“I Wish” by Skee-Lo:

Real lyrics:

I wish I was little bit taller
I wish I was a baller
I wish I had a girl who looked good
I would call her
I wish I had a rabbit in a hat with a bat
And a six four Impala

I hear:

I wish I was little bit taller
I wish I was a baller
I wish I had a girl with a kid
I would call her
I wish I had a rabbit in a hat with a bat
And a six foot baller

146

Robert Plant - “Tall Cool One”

Actual lyrics:

You stroll, you jump, you’re hot and you tease
'Cause I’m your tall cool one and I’m built to please

When it came out my best friend at the time and I both heard:

You stroll, you jump, you harden your Ts
'Cause I’m your tall cool one and I’m built to please

147

Elton John again:

Real lyrics:

Rocket man
Burnin’ out this fuse
Up here alone

Heard:

Rocket man
Burnin’ up his shoes
At perihelion

148

From Radar Love by Golden Earring
Actual lines: We’ve got a thing that’s called radar love / We’ve got a wave in the air
What I heard: We’ve got a thing that’s called red-hot love / We’ve got to wave in the air

From Invisible Touch by Genesis:
Actual line: She seems to have an invisible touch, yeah.
What I heard: She seems to have a busy butt, touch it.

149

That’s exactly what I heard when I first listened to that song. I’m still not convinced the girl doesn’t have a kid.

150

Amos Moses

Lyric: Lived a man called Doc Milsap
Misheard: Lived a man called Duckbill South

151

I heard “red-eye love.” I wasn’t sure what it meant, but I assumed a lot of partying. :slight_smile:

152

Haven’t read the whole thread, but I doubt that my examples came up yet, because no one else is such a doofus:

Jimi Hendrix - Voodoo Chile (NOT Slight Return, the slow, long version on Electric Ladyland)

Original:

“Well, mountain lions found me there waitin’
And set me on an eagle’s back
Well, mountain lions found me there
And set me on an eagle’s wing
(It’s the eagle’s wing, baby, what did I say?)
He took me past to the outskirts of infinity
And when he brought me back
He gave me a Venus witch’s ring”

I heard:

“…
He gave me a penis which is red”

Then I thought for a long time that J. J. Cale sang “They Call Me The Priest”. No, they called him the breeze.

153

This is covered by Cecil Adams in one of his better-known essays. I’ll let you look it up.

154

UB40: “Red Red Wine you make me feel so fine, I feel like Abdullah when you’re just in arms”.

Of course it’s not Abdullah, but a million dollars.

The Kinks “All Day and All of the Night” sounds to me like “Olay and all of the night, Olay…”.

155

Van Halen’s version of “You Really Got Me”

Actual lyrics:

You got me so I can’t sleep at night

I thought Dave was singing:

You got me so I kiss you at night

156

The Beatles - Oh Darling

I heard that a hundred times on the radio at the time and I thought Paul was singing “Oh Johnny”. The Beatles were breaking up when it was released, and I heard it as Paul’s lament that John was the cause of it (“When you told me you didn’t need me anymore”) and his own reaction to it (“I nearly broke down and cried”). When I finally found out what he was really singing, I couldn’t believe how one misheard word changed the entire context of the song.

157

It’s known as the “Seattle twang”. Those Seattleites are nothing but hicks from the sticks.

158

Ricky Skaggs lyric:
Don’t get above your raising….

What I heard:
Go get a bloody razor

:smack:

I blame that damnable hillbilly bluegrass twang.

159

Don Henley’s “Boys of Summer”

Real lyric: “I saw a Dead Head sticker on a Cadillac”
I hear: “I saw a dead head sticking out of a Cadillac” (yikes!)

160

For real or that’s just your take on it because you don’t like the song?