OT - Fractured Song Lyrics
My first music collection consisted of 2nd or worse generation cassette tapes, thanks to a friend with a dual tape deck. The sound quality was often not so great, and I at times had no idea what some of the singers were saying. So my teenage brain just filled in the blanks and decades later I still remember some of the stuff I came up with. Here’s The Who talking about “My Jean Machine”, obviously a sexual reference (what isn’t to a teenager…) and AC/DC offering to do dirty deeds in the “Dunder Jeep”. I figured that must be a really cool Australian ORV. Anyway just wondering if any other old timers have similar tales to tell.
Also a toast to the end of OT season.
August 20th, 2023 at 1:11 AM ^
Every Time You Go Away by Paul Young
song: “every time you go away, you take a piece of me with you”
my 7 year old brain: “every time you go away, you take a piece of meat with you”
August 20th, 2023 at 8:32 PM ^
The Who's "Who are you, who who, who who"
When I was a kid I thought it was "New Orleans, New New, New new...."
I still sing it that way to piss off my wife:)
August 20th, 2023 at 1:25 AM ^
You might enjoy this web site https://www.kissthisguy.com/ named after a misheard lyric from Purple Haze.
August 20th, 2023 at 1:53 AM ^
Secret….Asian man. Turns out it was Secret agent man?
August 20th, 2023 at 12:54 PM ^
Same here. Even now - knowing what the actual lyric is - it still sounds to me like he's saying "Asian".
August 20th, 2023 at 2:52 AM ^
"relax don't do it, when you want to get to it, when you want to come....... shoot it in my direction"
as I kid listening on magnetic tape, I thought that song was about ejaculation.... never did listen on CD to find out what the real lyrics were about
August 20th, 2023 at 9:59 AM ^
Wait...it's not?
August 20th, 2023 at 10:01 AM ^
Ummm...
August 20th, 2023 at 10:17 AM ^
I am not sure quite how to tell you this, BUT....
August 20th, 2023 at 10:47 AM ^
OK team... I should have put the sarcasm note in there!
When you first hear those lyrics you are like:
"Wait is that what he's singing about? no way someone makes a song about that. Yep, he's singing about that and he wants me to shoot in his direction."
August 20th, 2023 at 4:36 AM ^
I was a huge tool fan as a teenager and this was right around Windows 95 so home Internet was in its infancy.
Trying to decipher some of Maynard's lyrics was a chore. I remember repeatedly rewinding prison sex trying to figure out what he was saying. I had these really nice Koss headphones and I still couldn't ever get it right
August 20th, 2023 at 4:40 AM ^
Also Pearl Jams Yellow Ledbetter and pretty much anything else Eddie sings is just basically vowel sounds
On a feeling
On a wasted on awayyyyyyyy
Say
Lemme see
I wanna leave it again
One was all head
Beeeeeesawwwwwwwww all said
I wanna leave it again
On a Weiner
Ina Weiner all the way...
August 20th, 2023 at 8:05 AM ^
Yellow Ledbetter was a collection of stray lyrics Eddie had in notebooks.
The first lyric is "Unsealed" with an emphasis on the "ed." It blew my teenage mind when I was told this.
August 20th, 2023 at 8:22 AM ^
I never knew that. I think it's a lovely song. That guitar solo is one of the greatest of all time. It just fits so perfectly. And it's a great song to sing along to because it's almost impossible to mess up the lyrics
August 20th, 2023 at 8:22 AM ^
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!! + a million!!!
August 20th, 2023 at 4:55 AM ^
My high school friend Taru always insisted that in Mrs. Robinson, Simon + Garfunkel sang "Going to the candidates' to bake..." (as in smoke weed -- the real line is "candidates' debate.") Decades later, I still sing along with his 'new and improved' lyrics, an ongoing nod to an old friend.
August 20th, 2023 at 6:59 AM ^
not me, but a long-time friend had his older brothers convince him when he was a grade schooler that the background chorus to the drifters famous song, 'up on the roof' was 'a boneroo'. because of this his nickname his whole life has been 'bone' and yeah, sometimes 7th grade lasts forever. he is old and gray now, extraordinarily accomplished, but is still 'bone' to his long time friends.
EDIT: I remembered another from 40 years ago. There’s an old Van Halen song that has a refrain where they say “have you seen juniors grades lately? “. I don’t know if it’s intentional or not but we always used to say “have you seen juniors brains lately? “
August 20th, 2023 at 7:10 AM ^
My mom thought that Michael Jackson's "don't stop till you get enough" was actually "don't stop till you get it up" and would always turn off that devil music whenever it came on the radio.
August 20th, 2023 at 9:57 AM ^
Isn't all music devil's music to anyone older than the teenagers listening to it?
August 20th, 2023 at 7:20 AM ^
Big ol' Jed had a light on...
August 20th, 2023 at 7:33 AM ^
🎶 Shitty me no like it
Dundundun dun dun
Wash the cat box
Wash the cat box 🎶
August 20th, 2023 at 7:43 AM ^
Steve Winwood, the Finer Things:
Actual: "While there is time, Let's go out and feel everything"
Misheard: "While there is time, let's go out and kill everything"
Madonna, La Isla Bonita
Actual: "A young girl with eyes like the desert"
Misheard: "Young girls with eyes like potatoes" (Thank you Stroh Signature/chocolate Michelob)
August 20th, 2023 at 8:11 AM ^
"It doesn't make a difference if we're naked or not." Bon Jovi, Livin' on a Prayer
August 20th, 2023 at 8:28 AM ^
blinded by the light, wrapped up like a douche in the middle of the night
August 20th, 2023 at 10:44 AM ^
No matter how long I have known the correct lyric now, I still sing that version in my head.
August 20th, 2023 at 8:49 AM ^
I had a buddy wonder why Jimi needed to be excused “while I kiss this guy”.
Also wondered about who this Captain Slogg that Captain Kirk wrote to each week was.
August 20th, 2023 at 8:58 AM ^
Try listening to Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" after your friends kid insists the lyrics are "Hot dogs...and potatoes"!!!
You'll never not hear it again.
August 20th, 2023 at 9:30 AM ^
When our daughter was in grade school she participated in a “talent show” which just consisted of the kids dancing or doing goofy stuff onstage while a variety of songs were played on a boombox. One of the songs was “Little Deuce Coupe” by the Beach Boys and I tried to convince her the song was “Little Goose Poop” which made her giggle.
August 20th, 2023 at 1:42 PM ^
Trying the Little Miss Sunshine thing?
August 20th, 2023 at 9:58 AM ^
Not fractured, but a parody…
I was a kid living in Northern Virginia in the 90’s when the whole John and Lorena Bobbit story was a big thing. So it was both local and national news for us.
Lion King was also the most popular kids movie at the time. And “in the jungle the mighty jungle” was very popular too from the movie.
this was a popular one to sing at my elementary school:
”In the bedroom, the mighty bedroom, John Bobbit sleeps tonight
In the Kitchen, the mighty Kitchen, Lorena sharpens her knives….
A wiener whack, a wiener whack, a wiener whack, a wiener whack, a weiner whack, a wiener whack”
Also from the Lion King:
”Pennnnnnnsylvannnnia, that is where I am from.
Pink Pajamas Penguins on the bottom, Pink Pajamas Penguins on the bottom”
August 20th, 2023 at 10:09 AM ^
The first time I remember hearing "Whole Lotta Love" by Led Zeppelin I starting laughing because I thought he said "you need kool-aid."
I was probably 7-8 years old and my dad quickly corrected me.
August 20th, 2023 at 10:11 AM ^
It was early 90’s i was working like crazy, had a baby at home, another on the way … no time to listen to much music. Neighbor/ coworker had a band and was playing the Blind Pig. Between sets I told him I liked the song “These things are bound to happen” that I had probably heard on WCBN at work, and said I liked their cover of it. After a little deciphering and me singing it, we determined it was (This) “Monkey(‘s) Gone To Heaven” by the Pixies. Next time I saw them they substituted my lyrics for a few refrains.
August 20th, 2023 at 10:28 AM ^
I had an old cassette of Sticky Fingers without any track listings.
Mick garbles "can't you hear me knocking" so badly that I never had any idea what it was. I just kept singing "canna nama lovin'" or something.
Years later I got the actual record and was like ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh that makes more sense.
August 20th, 2023 at 10:39 AM ^
The police. Don’t stand so close to me. At 8 I juuuuust slightly missed the concept.
“blue special. Blue special. Blue special Oldsmobile!”
August 20th, 2023 at 10:44 AM ^
Controversy by Prince
My daughter thought 'controversy' was 'c*nt or p*ssy'
August 20th, 2023 at 3:00 PM ^
Oh, man. "Controversy" is my favorite Prince song but this may have ruined it for me. LOL
August 20th, 2023 at 11:08 AM ^
Bob Dylan's "Lay, Lady, Lay": "Silly putty but his hands dry clean."
aka, "His clothes are dirty but his hands are clean."
August 20th, 2023 at 11:14 AM ^
There's actually a term for this: a mondegreen. It's a lot of fun to look up, as you'll find dozens and dozens of examples.
August 20th, 2023 at 11:51 AM ^
I only recently realized that Sting did not stop in his tracks for fear of walking on the Mimes he slayed.
August 20th, 2023 at 3:33 PM ^
While we're talking Sting / the Police: In King of Pain, I hear "A skeleton choking on a crust of bread" half the time and "A skeleton choking on a gust of air" the other half. I think it's the latter, but I've convinced myself that wither or both make sense.
August 20th, 2023 at 5:39 PM ^
To my ears, Every little thing she does is magic ends with a strange warning about body odor.
August 20th, 2023 at 4:10 PM ^
From Wikipedia:
In a 1954 essay in Harper's Magazine, Sylvia Wright described how, as a young girl, she misheard the last line of the first stanza from the seventeenth-century ballad, "the Bonnie Eearly O'Moray. She wrote:
"When I was a child, my mother used to read aloud to me from Percy's Reliques, and one of my favorite poems began, as I remember:
Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,
Oh, where hae ye been?
They hae slain the Earl of o' Moray,
And Lady Mondegreen."
The correct fourth line is, "And laid him on the green." Wright explained the need for a new term:
"The point about what I shall hereafter call mondegreens, since no one else has thought up a word for them, is that they are better than the original."
August 20th, 2023 at 12:09 PM ^
For a very long time, I was certain that Mick Jagger was singing "I'm so affable, I'm so affable, I'm so affable and she's so cold." For those of you not of my vintage, the actual lyrics are "I'm so hot for her."
August 21st, 2023 at 12:39 AM ^
I always thought is was fuckable.
August 20th, 2023 at 12:17 PM ^
Metallica song 72 Seasons
What is sung 🎶 Wrath of Man
What I hear 🎶 Rack of Lamb
Jimi 🎶‘scuse me while I kiss this guy
The AC/DC song Big Balls is about ballroom dance parties
August 20th, 2023 at 12:29 PM ^
Speaking of Metallica, I initially thought instead of "Sad but true" they were singing "Sex patrol"
August 20th, 2023 at 12:45 PM ^
For years I thought Stevie Nicks was singing “just like the one-winged dove…” even though I am surrounded by white winged doves here in AZ.
August 20th, 2023 at 2:01 PM ^
Sometime in our first year of dating, my wife once very confidently and loudly belted out the chorus of "Panama" as "Burn it up!" After laughing for like five minutes I explained what the actual lyric is. She was so confident.
Every now and then I'll just turn and shout "Burn it up!" at her and we'll both burst out laughing.
August 20th, 2023 at 2:25 PM ^
A friend of mine thought it was "Ready to rock!"
August 20th, 2023 at 11:51 PM ^
Nice one. This reminds me of a family trip to Acapulco in the 80's, in a restaurant bar one evening. The young Mexican waitress blowing around the place had soooo much confidence belting out the lyrics to Hall & Oats' Man Eater except:
"Wooh Jessica! Watch out boy she'll chew you up! Wooh Jessica!"
I didn't have it in me to break the groove she was in and let her know it was "Wooh here she comes."