History Main / IndecipherableLyrics

* Music/EveryoneKnowsThat has such bad quality, nobody can tell what the real lyrics are.

* "Bennie and the Jets", particularly the part Music/EltonJohn goes falsetto. Parodied in a Music/TheBeastieBoys cover, where Mike D intentionally sings the song in Elton-ish gibberish. Also parodied in the film ''Film/TwentySevenDresses'' where the drunk protagonist sings the chorus wrongly, in front of an audience.

* Mark E. Smith of Music/TheFall has made a career out of notoriously indecipherable wordplay (accompanied by equally inscrutable music).

* Music/CrystalCastles, mainly due to the deliberate audio distortion of Alice's vocals.

* Most [[{{Industrial}} Terror-EBM/Aggrotech/Hellektro]] songs, due to using [[GutturalGrowler harsh guttural vocals]].

* The entire ''WesternAnimation/{{Coraline}}'' [[https://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=DCD67CE98D531DCE&search_query=coraline soundtrack]] is made of these. Bruno Coulais may be a frickin' wizard, but hey, TrueArtIsIncomprehensible.

* Music/CaravanPalace's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sBZdSHAIZI Clash]]" is not as bad as other examples, since you can more or less understand about half of the words, but still, good luck trying to comprehend the singers. (The lyrics come from a song called [[http://rock.totaltabs.com/tablature/Brook_Benton/Shadrack_Chord_64674/ Shadrack]], but they're jumbled and garbled.)

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjOqwDAYaig "Clever Sleazoid"]] and [[http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/direngrey/childprey.html Child Prey]] by Dir En Grey are three-minute streams of GratuitousEnglish. The listener can be forgiven for not realizing either song contains actual words in any language. Popular reinterpretations of the lyrics include "I heard the sound of all the [[Franchise/{{Pokemon}} Chanseys]]" and "Let's get a SMOOTHAY."

* Music/DirEnGrey. Every. Single. Song. Even if you speak Japanese, you still won't understand Kyo. And the songs in English are ''even worse''.

* There's various overlapping chants towards the end of "I Am the Walrus" by Music/TheBeatles from ''Music/MagicalMysteryTour''. A popular interpretation of one of the more audible ones is [[WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs "everybody smoke pot!"]], which is close enough since it's actually "Everybody's got one, got one, got one" (the other one is "Oompah oompah stick it up your jumper").

* [[Music/{{Metalocalypse}} Dethklok]] frontman Nathan Explosion [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this hilariously:

*** '''[[MemeticMutation I. LIKE. JUICE!!]]'''

* ''VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}'' and ''VideoGame/{{Persona 3}}'' music is in English, but you are forgiven for not knowing this. Even if you look up the lyrics, it's still hard to tell what they're saying.
** Ditto for the major boss theme and the "fierce battle" theme in ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIIINocturne''.

* The majority of Music/NewKingdom's lyrics are this.
* The obvious example is "Louie Louie", as performed by the Kingsmen in 1963. The song was a radio hit with a totally indecipherable slur of syllables, and some of the song's popularity came from public discussion of what the song was about. As rumors flew wildly, the song even caught the attention of the FBI, which investigated the song, believing that a song slurred so seriously must contain obscenity or pro-drug propaganda. The FBI agents were never able to decipher the song's mushy audio, and charges were dropped. The singer admitted he was so drunk that he couldn't remember exactly what he did sing at the time. (Other sources say that he had vocal strain that day, and was a little far from the mic due to its being so high.)
** Famously, ''ComicStrip/BloomCounty'' spoofed this during the 1988 election with an ad by the Meadowcrats (the political party formed by the main characters) which tried to use the candidates' respective interpretations of the lyrics to show their character.
*** Dukakis: "Ring in my nose; falafel hair"
*** Bush: "Messy Paul Anka moons a dove" (most of the transcriptions were ''less'' intelligible)
** Actually, there WAS one obscenity in it. At about 0:50, the drummer makes a mistake and shouts "oh, fuck!". Careful enough listening and loudness should do the trick.
* Music/{{Can}} during the Damo Suzuki years. Very much intentional - Damo pretty much sang whichever syllables he felt like singing at any given moment, regardless of whether they formed words or were clearly articulated. ("Did anybody see the snowman? Stannah wit deleeeeaux.")

* Much of Music/{{Nightwish|Band}}'s music before "Dark Passion Play".
** Special mention should go to the last part of the song "Fantasmic". Then again, even with the lyrics next to you, you don't have a clue what it all actually means. It's one long {{nerdgasm}} about the Franchise/DisneyAnimatedCanon. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WVP3JUCwGQ No, really]].

* "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Music/{{Nirvana}}, as with most of their songs. "Tourette's" doesn't even have lyrics, just [[SingingSimlish gibberish screaming]].
** Parodied in "Smells Like Nirvana" by Music/WeirdAlYankovic. See the quote.
*** Reportedly, when Al asked Kurt Cobain for permission to do the parody, Cobain asked "It's not going to be about food, is it?" and Al responded "No, it'll be about how no one can understand your lyrics." That was what really sold Kurt on it.
** A good example is the ongoing confusion as to what exactly the chorus of the outtake "Token Eastern Song" is - the main contenders are "hold it in your gut" and "born in a junkyard" (it was sometimes bootlegged under the latter title). Even on the clearer recording used for the ''With The Lights Out'' box set, that section remains pretty unintelligible.

** Many Music/{{The Rolling Stones|Band}}' songs have this. Music/MickJagger often intentionally slurred certain lyrics so nobody would be able to tell how dirty they were.

* "Bennie and the Jets", particularly the part Music/EltonJohn goes falsetto.
** Parodied in a Music/TheBeastieBoys cover, where Mike D intentionally sings the song in Elton-ish gibberish.
** Parodied in the film ''Film/TwentySevenDresses'' where the drunk protagonist sings the chorus wrongly, in front of an audience.

** Likewise several 2D-heavy {{Music/Gorillaz}} songs - "El Manana" for instance. Even the lyric videos for their ''Song Machine''-era music poke a bit of fun at this tendency, by occasionally adding in lyrics that are blatantly incorrect, but there's just enough room to wonder if they just ''might'' actually be accurate.
* Pretty much everything by Music/JoeCocker, especially "Feelin' Alright".
** [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] hilariously in [[http://jeffpicard.com/blog/?p=1646 this video]], "captioned for the clear-headed".

* Some of the songs on Music/PearlJam's album ''{{Music/Ten|PearlJamAlbum}}''.
** The ''Ten'' outtake "Yellow Ledbetter" too, making for an amusing Misheard Lyrics [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLd22ha_-VU video]].

* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEulQJkc9UE "murmur twins"]] from ''[[VideoGame/{{Beatmania}} beatmania IIDX]]''.
** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttApRGnRO74 Little Little Princess]]" fits this trope pretty well too-- it's not clear, other than a few words here and there, that it was even in ''English''.
** And who could forget... [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bybkLlNbaaw GOLD RUSH!]] Try making out ''any'' words other than "Make it! Make money!" and the names of the Beatmania games. I dare you.
*** IT'S MY TWINKIE!

* "Micro Cuts" by Music/{{Muse}}. This song is sung so insanely high (even by Matt Bellamy's standards!), that it's near impossible to tell what he's saying the first time through.

** These, however, pale in comparison to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yaYO0_NXhc Execution Commentary]] from the Plug in Baby EP. Just... listen to it. Hell, check any official page for lyrics. Chances are it'll read [[spoiler: (Indecipherable screaming)]], which, frankly, is rather to the point.

** Similarly, Karl Jenkins' ''Adiemus'' projects use the human voice more as an instrument -- none of the lyrics mean anything in any real language.
** Lisa Gerrard of Dead Can Dance (and solo) fame also sings in a made-up language that has no "real" meaning.
** Music/{{Enya}} also announced an album with a similar concept. Though it's worth noting that Enya's lyrics are already pretty indecipherable when she sings in ''English''.
* Music/LambOfGod falls victim to this due to the style of their singer Randy Blythe. If you sit down with the lyrics and read them as you listen to the song, you can get 99% of it (and remember it), with the notable exception of their first record ''Burn The Priest'', where it is all but impossible to understand a single thing that comes out of Randy's mouth.
** Don't forget about some of the songs from "New American Gospel"; a radio station even had a competition where the fans had to try and decipher the lyrics to the song "Black Label"

** It's so bad, that the [[http://wiki.animutationportal.com/We_Drink_Ritalin joke lyrics]] from the {{Animutation}} based on this song, [[http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/45257 We Drink Ritalin]] fits better than the original!

* Music/FallOutBoy's vocalist Patrick Stump is well known for his...lack of enunciation. The first line of the chorus of "Sugar, We're Going Down" has been translated to "We're going down tuuu in a luleelurah"[[note]]We're going down, down in an earlier round[[/note]], "Dance Dance" has become "Ted's Pants", and "This Ain't a Scene (It's a Arms Race)" apparently has the line "I'm a little man, and I'm also evil and also into cats"[[note]]Actually "I'm a leading man, and the lies I weave are oh so intricate"[[/note]].

*** It doesn't help that the official lyrics sometimes don't quite match up with what's actually being sung.

* Music/Sum41 is this with their short, fast songs. The most egregious example is 'Never Wake Up', in which the only intelligible line is the TitleDrop.
** Another example is the bridge from 'Motivation', in which Deryck sings a mouthful of words at an [[MotorMouth insane speed,]] which ends up sounding like "[=LeaLeavingfriendsjustbecomeatrendjanamsnsndnIcan'tpretend=], afraidofbeingthisway, it'snotthrsamebutwho'stoblameforallthe STUPID THINGS I NEVER SAID!" Have fun singing that on VideoGame/GuitarHero.

* Good luck trying to understand more than three words in Music/FooFighters' "White Limo".
** And its spiritual predecessor, "Weenie Beenie" (which is already in an album chock full of WordSaladLyrics, but like "White Limo" has modulated vocals to top it).

** Doesn't help that Kyo, being from Kyoto, speaks a markedly different dialect of Japanese.

* Desmond Dekker, one of the first internationally popular reggae artists, had a heavy Jamaican accent which made many of his lyrics difficult to understand to non-Jamaicans. The most commonly cited example is his 1969 single "Israelites"; the opening lines became "Get up in de morning, baked beans for breakfast!" and the refrain, "Poor me, Israelites" was often misheard as "Ohh, me ears are alight".
** An advert for non-dairy spread took advantage of this, claiming the song was about [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0zN4nXXvSc Vitalite]] spread.

** Note that this is pretty common with Mike Patton, who likes to use his [[ManOfAThousandVoices impressive range]] to rap, mumble, or just downright {{scatting}} (Music/FaithNoMore's "Ugly in The Morning" is a great case).
* Just about everything on Clap Your Hands Say Yea's "Coming Down" qualifies as this, especially when [[Music/TheNational Matt Berninger comes on]].
** Also the ending. "nenenenenennennenenenememehnehnehnehmehnemehIT'S THE WAAAY THAT IT IS STAY RIGHT THERE YOU KNOW I'M COMING DOWN"

* Averted ''but good'' by Music/NeilYoung. His ''lyrics'' may be strange, but his enunciation is crisp and clear.[[note]]This may be a side effect of what Music/JoniMitchell calls his "Canadian Prairie" accent, similar to hers.[[/note]] The Music/BobDylan 30th Anniversary Concert finale, "My Back Pages", features an assortment of legendary artists, who are all influenced by Bob and trying to mumble -- er, sing -- like him (including Bob Himself); Neil doesn't, and he is the only one you can understand.
** The only exceptions might be the majority of songs from the album ''Trans'' - six songs on the album had Neil making use of a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocoder vocoder]], which could make some of the lyrics difficult to understand without consulting a lyric sheet.

* As ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drm3kTpks7Q pointed out]], several Sting songs are incomprehensible except for a few words.

* Music/LambOfGod falls victim to this due to the style of their singer Randy Blythe. If you sit down with the lyrics and read them as you listen to the song, you can get 99% of it(and remember it), with the notable exception of their first record ''Burn The Priest'', where it is all but impossible to understand a single thing that comes out of Randy's mouth.

** It's so bad, that the [[http://wiki.animutationportal.com/We_Drink_Ritalin joke lyrics]] from the WebAnimation/{{Animutation}} based on this song, [[http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/45257 We Drink Ritalin]] fits better than the original!

* Michael Stipe of Music/{{REM}} had a reputation for this as well, as his somewhat quieter vocals were wedded to often fragmentary and elliptical lyrics. And then the loud, fast, overlapped vocals of "Star 69" on the ''Monster'' album was an entirely new way of being unintelligible. (though that came after "It's the End of the World as We Know It", where the random words sung very fast [[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein inspired a related trope]]) Lampshaded with one press advertising campaign for ''Music/AutomaticForThePeople'', which had a series of speculations as to what the single-line chorus of "The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonite" actually was.

-->-- '''Music/WeirdAlYankovic''', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FklUAoZ6KxY Smells Like Nirvana]]''

* Desmond Dekker, one of the first internationally popular reggae artists, had a heavy Jamaican accent which made many of his lyrics difficult to understand to non-Jamaicans. The most commonly cited example is his 1969 single "Israelites"; even the refrain, "Poor me, Israelites" was often misheard as "Ohh, me ears are alight".