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Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 3:55 pm
by Phil Reynolds
Matt Morrison wrote:Just had SOAD's Darts pop up on shuffle and it reminded me how I thought for quite a while it said "Life threatening lifestyles: a hitman, a nun, florist."
Well, that's 37 seconds of my life I'll never get back.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 4:00 pm
by Matt Morrison
Phil Reynolds wrote:
Matt Morrison wrote:Just had SOAD's Darts pop up on shuffle and it reminded me how I thought for quite a while it said "Life threatening lifestyles: a hitman, a nun, florist."
Well, that's 37 seconds of my life I'll never get back.
It's 2:41.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 5:34 pm
by Phil Reynolds
Matt Morrison wrote:
Phil Reynolds wrote:Well, that's 37 seconds of my life I'll never get back.
It's 2:41.
I'm not sure how I managed to put up with 37 seconds of it.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 5:57 pm
by Ian Volante
Matt Morrison wrote:Just had SOAD's Darts pop up on shuffle and it reminded me how I thought for quite a while it said "Life threatening lifestyles: a hitman, a nun, florist."

Ha, love it!

Phil, that's not the most accessible of their albums, I recommend Toxicity :)

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2012 6:23 pm
by Thomas Carey
All my life (well, since the song came out) I thought Taio Cruz was singing 'I throw my hands up in the air sometimes, saying aaaoo, Galileo' instead of 'Gotta let go'. I always thought that was the real lyric and never considered it being anything else... oh well. :oops:

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2012 9:15 pm
by Mike Brown
In (ahem) Carly Rae Jepsen's classic hit "Call Me Maybe", I swear she sings "I missed your school bag, I missed your school, school bag." Something to do with satchels, I expect.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2012 12:55 am
by Mark James
Green Day's Burnout came on my ipod the other day and I was reminded how I used to think the lyric "I live inside this mental cave " was "I live inside this pencil case", even though the first time I heard the song was when I bought the album and therefore had the lyric sheet. I love that we get lyrics wrong even when we know what the real ones are. It also kind of made me think living in a pencil case would be cool.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2012 11:57 am
by Jennifer Steadman
Mark James wrote:Green Day's Burnout came on my ipod the other day and I was reminded how I used to think the lyric "I live inside this mental cave " was "I live inside this pencil case", even though the first time I heard the song was when I bought the album and therefore had the lyric sheet. I love that we get lyrics wrong even when we know what the real ones are. It also kind of made me think living in a pencil case would be cool.
I too used to think this.

As an infant, I thought Wonderwall's chorus was "Because maybe, you're gonna be the one at Sainsbury's".

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2012 5:50 pm
by Julie T
In 'Warwick Avenue' by Duffy, I used to think she sang "Promise me you won't stand by the line", so he woudn't be tempted to jump when she told him the bad news.

I watched her video recently with subtitles on a programme about London tunes, and found she really sings "Promise me you won't step out of line". Oops.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2012 10:56 am
by Peter McNamara
Peter Kay's "The Tour That Didn't Tour" (shown last night on C4) includes a Mondegreen set. On 4OD it runs for seven minutes from 1.13 to 1.20.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2012 11:46 am
by Ian Volante
Peter McNamara wrote:Peter Kay's "The Tour That Didn't Tour" (shown last night on C4) includes a Mondegreen set. On 4OD it runs for seven minutes from 1.13 to 1.20.
Aye, there were some great ones there!

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Aug 22, 2012 9:30 pm
by Heather Styles
Boney M, Brown Girl in the Ring: "All the world had fruit cake" ("All had water run dry")

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Aug 24, 2012 3:09 pm
by Ian Volante
FGTH - Welcome To The Pleasuredome:

There goes a supernova, right up her shoulder

Actually, it's:

There goes a supernova, what a pushover.

I always thought it sounded odd. It's only taken me 28 years to sort that one out.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2013 9:56 am
by Ryan Taylor
Salt N Pepa - Whatta Man

"Whatta man, whatta man, whatta man, whatta honeycomb man."

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2013 11:06 am
by Matt Morrison
Literally only yesterday worked out that Shaggy must have been getting all patois and saying "Mr. Romantic, say mi fantastic" whereas I always thought he was only "semi-fantastic".

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2013 11:38 am
by Dave Preece
Peter Kay Funny Song Lyrics off You Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cylsLhQaPFw

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Nov 30, 2013 1:20 am
by Zarte Siempre
Matt Morrison wrote:Literally only yesterday worked out that Shaggy must have been getting all patois and saying "Mr. Romantic, say mi fantastic" whereas I always thought he was only "semi-fantastic".
...I still hadn't realised that :(

My favourite one (that wasn't mine) was someone who thought the opening line of Reward by The Teardrop Explodes was, rather than "Bless my cotton socks, I'm in the news"; "Pass my cotton socks, I'm in the nude"

2 of the ones I've been responsible for:

"Here comes the rain again, falling on my head like a lemon tree" ((It made sense in my head))

and a more obscure reference to 1-hit wonder from the 90's Meredith Brooks (but an album track cause my Mum had it)

"I might crap, but I'll never splatter"


In other news, this might be my favourite thread on the entire website.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Tue Dec 10, 2013 9:17 am
by Jon O'Neill
From R Kelly's Ignition (Remix), I interpreted "running my hands through her 'fro" as "running my hands through her throat" which is altogether more sinister.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Tue Dec 10, 2013 11:21 am
by Andy McGurn
From Guns n' Roses Sweet Child of Mine.

I always thought the second verse started "shes got eyes like the bluest sky and fruitcake for a brain"

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Tue Dec 10, 2013 10:51 pm
by Thomas Carey
Until about a year ago, I thought the chorus of Taio Cruz's Dynamite was 'saying ayooo, Galileo'.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:19 am
by Zarte Siempre
Thomas Carey wrote:All my life (well, since the song came out) I thought Taio Cruz was singing 'I throw my hands up in the air sometimes, saying aaaoo, Galileo' instead of 'Gotta let go'. I always thought that was the real lyric and never considered it being anything else... oh well. :oops:
Thomas Carey wrote:Until about a year ago, I thought the chorus of Taio Cruz's Dynamite was 'saying ayooo, Galileo'.
Well it's been at least 18 months...

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2013 3:30 am
by Thomas Carey
Zarte Siempre wrote:
Thomas Carey wrote:All my life (well, since the song came out) I thought Taio Cruz was singing 'I throw my hands up in the air sometimes, saying aaaoo, Galileo' instead of 'Gotta let go'. I always thought that was the real lyric and never considered it being anything else... oh well. :oops:
Thomas Carey wrote:Until about a year ago, I thought the chorus of Taio Cruz's Dynamite was 'saying ayooo, Galileo'.
Well it's been at least 18 months...
Oops... :oops:

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Mar 10, 2014 10:13 pm
by Graeme Cole
Flash Delirium, by MGMT. I was wondering why they put what sounded like a cheat code for a computer game in this song: "six six five five left right shift".

On investigation, it turns out it's "six six five five red battleships".

Not sure that makes any more sense, though.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2014 10:50 am
by sean d
After 25 odd years I've just discovered that Paul Simon is actually calling someone Betty, not Daddy, in You Can Call Me Al. Mind=blown.
"I can call you Betty
And Betty when you call me
You can call me Al"

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 1:18 pm
by Ian Volante
sean d wrote:After 25 odd years I've just discovered that Paul Simon is actually calling someone Betty, not Daddy, in You Can Call Me Al. Mind=blown.
"I can call you Betty
And Betty when you call me
You can call me Al"
Ha! Me too, just now...

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Tue Apr 08, 2014 4:40 pm
by Conor
Chips Ahoy, by The Hold Steady. Instead of "it came in six lengths ahead", hearing "I came with six wanks I had". Don't like the song as much any more.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2014 6:30 pm
by James S Roper
In Dead or Alive's 'You Spin me Round', instead of hearing 'All I know is that to me', I kept hearing 'You look like a vasectomy'. I don't know why either.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2014 9:51 pm
by Jennifer Steadman
Only realised fairly recently that the line in Beyonce's seminal smash hit 'Crazy In Love' I had always heard as "I've been wetting myself/Baby I don't care" is actually "I've been playing myself/Baby I don't care". Bit disappointed as I was impressed by not only her honesty about her incontinence issues, but her blasé attitude towards it. Thought it was pretty edgy. (Genuinely did think those were the lyrics tho :( )

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2014 6:57 pm
by Jon Corby
Gravel Pit: "Wu-Tang is a city with a Travel Inn".

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2014 7:36 pm
by Ryan Taylor
Jon Corby wrote:Gravel Pit: "Wu-Tang is a city with a Travel Inn".
Actual lyrics: "Lincoln is a city with a Travel Lodge." I'm not surprised you didn't get it first time.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2014 7:37 pm
by Mark Deeks
Didn't realise you were into Wu Tang to be honest.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2014 7:54 pm
by Jon Corby
Mark Deeks wrote:Didn't realise you were into Wu Tang to be honest.
Nigger please.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 6:18 pm
by Graeme Cole
Melody's Echo Chamber: I've seen goats I can't explain.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 7:02 pm
by Zarte Siempre
Recently-ish, I watched the lyric video for The 1975 - Girls

What SHOULD be "Bite your face to spite your nose"

Was committed to YT as "I like your face despite your nose"

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:12 pm
by Graeme Cole
Many years ago, I heard this song, and assumed the lyrics were "2, 4, 6, 8, never too late" or something like that. (Yes - I know - shush you - let me finish.) Some time more recently someone mentioned the song and called it 2-4-6-8 Motorway, so I then thought I must have heard it wrong. I even remember thinking "I could have sworn it was 'never too late', but oh well."

Even more recently than that I thought to post about it in this thread, thinking that mishearing lyrics which are actually included in the title must qualify as some kind of super-mondegreen and beat all the others. However, remembering it and being in front of my computer never coincided until now. It only remained for me to check what the actual lyrics were, and then it turned out that I was right the first time, and "2-4-6-8 Motorway" never appears in the song.

What is this? A reverse mondegreen? A meta-mondegreen?

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:28 pm
by Heather Styles
A mondegreem?

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Mar 23, 2015 11:30 pm
by Ian Volante
Graeme Cole wrote:Many years ago, I heard this song, and assumed the lyrics were "2, 4, 6, 8, never too late" or something like that. (Yes - I know - shush you - let me finish.) Some time more recently someone mentioned the song and called it 2-4-6-8 Motorway, so I then thought I must have heard it wrong. I even remember thinking "I could have sworn it was 'never too late', but oh well."

Even more recently than that I thought to post about it in this thread, thinking that mishearing lyrics which are actually included in the title must qualify as some kind of super-mondegreen and beat all the others. However, remembering it and being in front of my computer never coincided until now. It only remained for me to check what the actual lyrics were, and then it turned out that I was right the first time, and "2-4-6-8 Motorway" never appears in the song.

What is this? A reverse mondegreen? A meta-mondegreen?
Ah, thanks for that. I had the same problem - at some point I "realised" that I had it wrong, but using the word "motorway" never quite fit properly. lulz

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sun Jun 14, 2015 8:17 pm
by Adam Gillard
Heather Styles wrote:A mondegreem?
:)

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Dec 25, 2015 11:07 am
by Adam Gillard
"Bob the Builder, Tanmay Dixit?"

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2016 11:52 am
by Zarte Siempre
I'm not sure whether it counts if you're pretty sure you're hearing it wrong and can hazard a guess.

But I only thought to confirm today that the lyrics to Pretenders - Middle of the Road don't include the line

"I'm standing in the middle of life with my pants behind me"

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 8:48 am
by Zarte Siempre
Two from other people I've discovered today.

Someone thought Elton John was singing "Hold me closer Tony Danza" - Plausible.

And that Macy Gray was singing "I blow bubbles when you are not near" - Less plausible.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 2:49 pm
by JimBentley
Zarte Siempre wrote:Someone thought Elton John was singing "Hold me closer Tony Danza" - Plausible.
That's got to be the best-known one after "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" - it's even been in an episode of 'Friends' (or some similarly bland sitcom of the era). While we're on Elton though, I thought for quite a while that in "Island Girl", he was singing "I Like Girls", which I found highly entertaining for obvious reasons.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 8:55 pm
by Zarte Siempre
JimBentley wrote:
Zarte Siempre wrote:Someone thought Elton John was singing "Hold me closer Tony Danza" - Plausible.
That's got to be the best-known one after "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" - it's even been in an episode of 'Friends' (or some similarly bland sitcom of the era).
Genuinely didn't know that. Was the first time I'd heard it. (And I don't watch Friends)

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 11:55 am
by Ian Volante
Zarte Siempre wrote:
My favourite one (that wasn't mine) was someone who thought the opening line of Reward by The Teardrop Explodes was, rather than "Bless my cotton socks, I'm in the news"; "Pass my cotton socks, I'm in the nude"

In other news, this might be my favourite thread on the entire website.
Oh shit! I missed this first time, I never had more than a vague inkling that I had that line wrong!

And thanks :D

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 11:56 am
by Ian Volante
JimBentley wrote:
Zarte Siempre wrote:Someone thought Elton John was singing "Hold me closer Tony Danza" - Plausible.
That's got to be the best-known one after "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" - it's even been in an episode of 'Friends' (or some similarly bland sitcom of the era). While we're on Elton though, I thought for quite a while that in "Island Girl", he was singing "I Like Girls", which I found highly entertaining for obvious reasons.
Never heard the Tony Danza one, but I certainly had the 'I like girls' thing going on for a while.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 3:42 pm
by Marc Meakin
Two that spring to mind...... Don't bring me down......Bruce . ELO and pulling muscles for Michelle......by Squeeze

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Jun 30, 2016 4:29 pm
by JimBentley
Marc Meakin wrote:... Don't bring me down......Bruce . ELO
I've always thought it was this (up until a couple of minutes ago when I read Marc's post) even though it didn't really make any sense. I've just looked up what it actually is and I think I'm sticking with "Bruce" because the real lyric makes even less sense.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2016 5:54 am
by Marc Meakin
When they sung it at Glastonbury I could see the backing singers saying Bruce.....but it was Groos originally

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Fri Jul 01, 2016 1:54 pm
by Zarte Siempre
I've been singing Bruce for years... what the hell is Groos?

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2016 6:33 am
by Marc Meakin
There is a sort of explanation on the songs Wiki page that explains the live version version confusion also

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sat Jul 02, 2016 8:19 pm
by JJ Smith
In Everything in its Right Place (the best song ever) I thought he was singing 'Yesterday I woke up sucking on my mum' instead of a lemon. Changed the song a bit for me when I found that out.
Another line in that song, I thought was "There are arctic colours in my head". I like my version better.

When I was about 6 I thought "Georgia's always on my mind" in Back in the USSR was "Jojo's always on my mind", and it was the same Jojo as in Get Back, and that it was maybe a real person. I thought he was like, married to Jojo or something, and the line meant that he missed her when he was away in Russia.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2016 5:59 pm
by Matt Morrison
Only just got around to "in the pines" instead of "in the palace" from Where Did You Sleep Last Night? after doing it on karaoke.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2016 8:42 pm
by Zarte Siempre
What do you call it when you know what the actual words are but STILL can't escape that it sounds like something else entirely...

What is it you lot think they're saying is about to explode?

https://youtu.be/gh-pGxZBQ1Y?t=48s

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2016 8:57 pm
by Graeme Cole
Zarte Siempre wrote:What do you call it when you know what the actual words are but STILL can't escape that it sounds like something else entirely...

What is it you lot think they're saying is about to explode?

https://youtu.be/gh-pGxZBQ1Y?t=48s
Without having heard this before or read the lyrics, it sounds to me like "the speaker".

Perhaps it's a song about Parliamentary business having been unusually difficult recently.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2016 9:22 pm
by Marc Meakin
The Sue Lawley/So Lonely lyric always gets me

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2016 10:16 pm
by Zarte Siempre
Graeme Cole wrote:
Zarte Siempre wrote:What do you call it when you know what the actual words are but STILL can't escape that it sounds like something else entirely...

What is it you lot think they're saying is about to explode?

https://youtu.be/gh-pGxZBQ1Y?t=48s
Without having heard this before or read the lyrics, it sounds to me like "the speaker".

Perhaps it's a song about Parliamentary business having been unusually difficult recently.
OK, well you got the right lyric... am I the only person who thinks it sounds like sphincter?!

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2016 10:43 pm
by Gavin Chipper
All I'm hearing is that you shouldn't buy any components of your sound system from Argos.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 3:21 pm
by Ian Volante
Just realised that I had Def Leppard's Pour Some Sugar On Me wrong all these years.

I thought it was:

'I'm hot, can't sleep,
from my head, to my feet'.

That never sat right with me, but I never thought about it hard enough to correct it from 'can't sleep' to 'sticky sweet'.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 9:39 pm
by Adam Gillard
Zarte Siempre wrote:
Graeme Cole wrote:
Zarte Siempre wrote:What do you call it when you know what the actual words are but STILL can't escape that it sounds like something else entirely...

What is it you lot think they're saying is about to explode?

https://youtu.be/gh-pGxZBQ1Y?t=48s
Without having heard this before or read the lyrics, it sounds to me like "the speaker".

Perhaps it's a song about Parliamentary business having been unusually difficult recently.
OK, well you got the right lyric... am I the only person who thinks it sounds like sphincter?!
I also heard "speaker", can't speak on behalf of All Other People though.

Re: Mondegreens

Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2016 10:06 pm
by Euan Slatter
I CANT BELIEVE YOU KISS YOUR C**K AT NIGHT