Two from back in college. Back in the days of AM radio and inexpensive record players, it was never easy to decipher lyrics of songs from listening to the records. A friend of mine told me that he thought the first words to "Can't Help Myself" by the Four Tops were "Sugar fried honey crunch" instead of "Sugar Pie Honey Bunch", but the funniest one he told me was the beginning of Jefferson Airplane's "Somebody to Love", where somehow he thought Grace Slick's "When the truth is found to be lies" was "When the turkey's found to be live"! Now that would certainly change the meaning of that song...
Twisted Lyrics :
This from the time when my daughter was barely three and both of us were listening to Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs Robinson" on the home stereo in the living room. The reason for listening to this particular track was because I had it in the car and somehow I thought it always amused her. I got up and went to fetch something to drink and on my return as I entered the room with her back to me I overheard her singing along. I could not help laughing when I realised what she was singing, "and here's to you Mrs Rabbitson......"
I guess it was due to the fact that she always enjoyed watching Bugs Bunny and that could have influenced her to sing those twisted lyrics.
Do you have a story to share about twisted lyrics?
I guess it was due to the fact that she always enjoyed watching Bugs Bunny and that could have influenced her to sing those twisted lyrics.
Do you have a story to share about twisted lyrics?
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There are a number of threads on this topic, the most recent of which is HERE |
My favorite has got to be from the time I spent in Spain. At the time, the Rage Against the Machine song "Killing in the Name Of" was very popular and regularly played in the club scene. One of the refrains, over and over, is "and now you do what they told ya." All the Spaniards would scream along and, invariably, they were all screaming "que te chupa la polla." Over and over. (Honestly, it really does sound the same, especially in a loud club.) At the risk of spoiling the suspense for our non-Spanish-speaking friends, roughly, they were all screaming "suck a dick." Over and over.... |
I had my two sons in the back seat of the car and one of them piped up "Play every knuckle animal." I was stunned, I had no idea what he was talking about, so I asked. It turns out he was talking about the Jim Steinman written, Air Supply recorded song "Making Love Out of Nothing At All." We still laugh about that one. On another trip my younger son asked, while we were driving through a nice neighborhood "Is itchy mansion around here?" When we asked what he was talking about he explained "You know from the Gordon Lightfoot song, itchy mansion my name." The song of course was, "Did She Mention My Name?" Kids are great for this!!! |
From "Smack dab in the middle" done by Ray Charles and also by Ry Cooder, I always heard (and worst, repeated) "pick me a town in any clime" as "pick me a town in decline". Seeing as though the lyrics that follow are "people like a rocking time" it made good sense to me that when things are not going very well in town you might as well rock. With that logic, looking at the decline of numerous American cities over the last decades, there should be quite a few rocking towns stateside! |
According to my Google search, it's "Sugarpie honeybunch." Your wife's logic is sound, but then again, whoever said Holland-Dozier-Holland had to be logical? I kind of like my friend's version. Now that we have better playback systems, and the clarity (didn't say anything about musicality) of CD, I can actually make out the lyrrics on the CD too. By the way, I have a friend who plays with upsampling and other tricks to make CDs sound a lot better. He once brought me a burned version of Brenda Lee's "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" which would lead you to believe that Brenda wasn't the sweet little teenager we thought she was when she recorded that song. I know the lyrics are "Later we'll have some PUNKIN' pie and we'll all go carolin'", but when you listen to his version it sure sounds like the "f" word instead of "punkin'". I played this for my friends at a party and at an audio society meeting, and you should have seen the jaws drop! |