Misheard Song Lyrics

I've only heard it once and can't repeat it (I think I must've not been paying attention), but I once heard a line in Micro Cuts by Muse that I thought went "Snakes on a plane..."

'Course, in that particular song, it's almost impossible to make out the words anyway- and they're a bit word-salady...

I used to think Soundgarden's black hole sun was black old sun

also in System Of A Down's BYOB

I heard

but they sang

I also have no idea what they say before that

edited 30th May '10 1:35:45 PM by ssamredrum

^What I thought they said before that was "You feel us rise from the tablecloth" (it's actually "You feed us lies from the tablecloth"). Also, I had no idea what "and the ceiling dipped in oil" ("hangars sitting dipped in oil", although that's still pretty weird) was meant to mean...

This is someone else's mondegreen that came up today when we were playing "You Oughta Know" by Alanis Morrissette on rock band: "It's not fair to deny me of the cross-eyed bear that you gave to me" (instead of "the cross I'd bear"). To be fair the actual lyric is sort of clumsy grammatically. Anyway, it makes me imagine Alanis and her ex battling for custody of a cross-eyed circus bear.

edited 30th May '10 9:45:11 PM by MikeK

Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody:

Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me

But I hear

Beelzebub has a weevil put inside of me

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

Here's one that I kinda like better than the original, and would believe was the original if every single lyric site didn't say different:

Subterranean Homesick Blues by Bob Dylan

He sang:

I heard:

Swearing seems like it'd be a bit uncharacteristic of Bob Dylan (I don't know many of his songs, but none of the others I know have profanity), but the line makes perfect sense that way, and it's just about impossible to for me to hear it as anything else.

"Pictures of You" by The Last Goodnight.

They sang: We are the boxers in the ring

I heard: We are the boxes in the rain

Cue odd mental image.

Additional trope examples required. Page is under attack. YKTTW launch detected.

Entirely possible he sung it both ways, and entirely possible bowdlerized lyrics got published.

A brighter future for a darker age.

That's true, that's very true. I didn't consider that.

Was I the only one for whom Vampire Weekend's "A-Punk" had Indecipherable Lyrics the first time around? I tried to do deliberate mondegreens for it at one point, but all I can remember is the chorus was "Lucas hide, the rain goat's comin', say oh", and first few lines were something like:

Tyrannosaurus slowly enter the city
Dachshund rainbow all filled with snow
Spattering a zombie finger
Oh, oh, oh

edited 6th Jul '10 8:12:39 PM by MikeK

I almost forgot my best one! I was seriously disappointed to find out these lyrics were wrong.

No Rain by Blind Melon

They sang:

I heard:

It completely reverses the meaning, but I really liked it better when I thought it was a The Cuckoolander Was Right type of thing.

edited 5th Sep '10 3:12:11 PM by Cameoflage

A Hazy Shade of Winter by Gilbert and Sullivan.

Ah looka roown, liifs are braun, and this guy is a hazy shape of winter!

Never be without a Hat! Hot means heat. I don't care if your usage dates to 1300, it's my word, not yours. My Pm box is open.

I believe you mean Hall And Oates.

But seriously, I do remember thinking that song included the line "look around, Lisa Brown".

Oh, and "My Time" by Minus The Bear - the chorus is "I got your days, I got your nights", but when it came on the radio one day a friend commented that it sort of sounded like "I got your dates, I got your nuts". There's a potential song parody about street vendors in there somewhere.

edited 11th Sep '10 8:36:09 PM by MikeK

Two headed boy, offloading in glass!

She's playing with fire! He's not ready for Nibbly Pig!

All these misheard song lyrics have given me some serious lulz. Thanks guys

A Hazy Shade of Winter is a Simon & Garfunkel song.

no one will notice that I changed this

Yeah, I assume Aliroz was being silly by deliberately crediting it to a "(last name) & (last name)" duo of a totally different genre, which is why I "corrected" him by doing the same. I now sort of wish I'd taken that joke further and said it was a Seltzer And Friedberg song.

edited 15th Sep '10 12:06:46 PM by MikeK

Mika is FULL of this. In One Foot Boy, he sings:

"There's a one foot boy eleven stone/ He's sittin' on my shoulder"

I heard:

"There's one foot boy in every store/ Sittin' on my shoulder"

I was like what is a "foot boy" and why is there only one in every store?

We're going to spread this shit like Nutella.

I didn't figure out that I had this wrong until just a few days ago... Addicted by Saving Abel.

The actual lyrics:

What I heard:

...In fact, as I think about it now, I wonder if there are actually two versions, because I thought I heard that second variation pretty distinctly.

Logged: The commanding officer is aboard. XO Pressley stands relieved.

I heard one line from "One World (Not Three)" by The Police as "a self-deluding prick" instead of "self-deluding trick".

Probably should get working on that essay now...

Paramore's "Turn It Off" has a partiularly strange one.

What she actually sings:

"And the worst part is before it gets any better, we're headed for a cliff. And in the free fall I will realise, I'm better off when I hit the bottom."

What I hear:

"And the worst part is before it gets any better, we're headed for a cliff. And in the free fall I will realise, I'm better off when I hit the bottle."

We're going to spread this shit like Nutella.

You heard correctly, those are the real words. The other line you had is from the edited version.

edited 25th Sep '10 12:41:35 AM by Malph

Old Gods of Asgard - "Children of the Elder God"

What they sing: "Warriors, torchbearers"
What I heard: "Warriors torch their ass"

Ouch.

"what the complete, unabridged, 4k ultra HD fuck with bonus features" - Mark Von Lewis

After Forver - "De-Energized"

Real lyrics: "I see a false alliance causing all this pain"

I heard: "I see a thousand lions causing all this pain"

I guess it is.

Trying to remember some of my best ones...

In I Am The Walrus

I heard

The real words are

Hilariously enough, I thought the 'penguin' part was a mishearing too before I looked up the real lyrics. Which are hella weird.

A few several from the Arctic Monkeys (when my dad used to listen to it in the car)

Is really

(Though, in my defence, he says it as 'andbook)

"Montigues and Calculus" is really, of course, a Romeo And Juliet reference that I didn't get at the time.

~Pirka