Rebecca Sparrow
by REBECCA SPARROW
Bless you, Karl Stefanovic. This week the Today Show host made me feel a little less like the Mayoress of Loser Town.
Karl and the divine Lisa Wilkinson were discussing one of my favourite topics: misheard song lyrics. And I’ve gotta say – the mistakes they mentioned in the segment were utterly horrendous (which made them brilliant) and left me feeling like I could join MENSA.
I mean, who knew that apparently millions of people think Pat Benatar is singing ‘hit me with your pet shark’ rather than ‘hit me with your best shot’? WTF people? It doesn’t even make sense. For starters, a pet shark? You haven’t even thought that through. And who gets ‘hit’ with a shark. Surely the word should be ‘slap’?
Next there was Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit. Twenty-years on and uncool parents everywhere still think Kurt Cobain was singing about being in a container. (Think: Here we are now, entertain us rather than Here we are now, IN CONTAINERS.)
Really, that five minute Today Show segment, left me feeling slightly vindicated – or at least less alone – since about two years ago I got caught singing the wrong lyrics to a song. I was trying to look cool at the gym while running on the treadmill. Trying to look hip in front of Jason my trainer who had the looks of The Commando and the personality of, well, The Commando.
And I found myself attempting to sing along to some cool-ass-gangster-rap-hip-hop-yo-yo-wassup-dawg song as I shuffled along on the treadmill like Cliff Young. And somehow I ended up singing the words. “Like a cheese stick, like a cheese stick” to a song that apparently is not dairy-focused. The song is called “Like a G6”. Allegedly. I think that sounds ridiculous. I mean, what the hell is a G6? My trainer however thought this was HYSTERICAL.
Oh how we laughed at my mistake. Well, he laughed. I made a mental note to send him an email virus.
“Alex the Seal!”
But it got me thinking about misheard song lyrics. A quick scan of my friends and it seems I’m not alone in screwing up words. Here are just a few of their mistakes:
- Cheap Wine and A Three Day Roast (Cheap Wine and A Three Day Growth by Cold Chisel)
- Save the Whales (Sail Away by Enya)
- Turn the Heater On (Turn The Beat Around by Gloria Estefan)
- We’re Gonna Get Dressed For Safe Sex (We’re Gonna Get Dressed For Success by Roxette)
- Alex The Seal (Our Lips Are Sealed by The Go-Gos)
- Our Father And Mark and Kevin (Our Father Who Art in Heaven, The Lord’s Prayer)
- Take your pants off and make it happen (Take your passion and make it happen – Flashdance)
- And one friend’s five-year-old is convinced ABBA’s Dancing Queen is “Dancing Bean. Dancing Bean. Feel the touch of your tangerine.”
So now I don’t feel quite so stupid. Well, I still feel stupid but I’m in good company. And at least I know the words to Smells Like Teen Spirit. I think.
Have you misread song lyrics before?
Comments
268 Comments so far
“Alex The Seal (Our Lips Are Sealed by The Go-Gos)” woohoo turns out I wasn’t the only one who thought these were the lyrics. To this day, I still prefer to sing ‘Alex the Seal” than “Our Lips are Sealed”, anyway!
loading...
Mum loves INXS but she was young and english is her second language so when she would hear the song ‘I Need You Tonight’ on the line “you’re one of my kind,” she would sing, “you wanna make cake.” It was hilarious when she told us and now every time the family hears the song, the cake vision is the version we sing.
loading...
My daughter was similiar to Alison’s daught and at aged 4 she would sing “Im a singlet, Im a singlet” instead of “All the single ladies” – Beyonce. it still makes me laugh
loading...
I can’t hear Sweet nothings by Calvin Harris ft Florence Welch, as anything but ‘Sweet Elephants’.
loading...
At the local school my children attend they had to relearn the second verse of the National anthem as the children were singing “for those who’ve come across the sea, we’ve found this place to share” s/b “for those who’ve come across the sea, we’ve boundless plains to share”.
Then there is the oldie but goodie “Australians all let us ring Joyce, for she is young and free”.
loading...
My sister got her mouth washed out with soap (ahh bless you mum!) for singing “let me hear your bottom talk” instead of “let me here your body talk”. for Olivia’s “lets get physical”… slight over reaction I think from my mum! My brother and I thought it was hilarious.
loading...
my friend and I were recently shocked to discover that it isn’t ‘unskinny BOP’ but ‘unskinny bob’ what the?!?! I’m sure that bop makes more sense than Bob!!
loading...
My friend thought Angus and Julia Stone’s Big Jet Plane said “Take you for a ride on a picture frame”. Ha!
loading...
In high school a girl from my class wrote out the lyrics to John Farnham’s “You’re the Voice”: instead of “(we all look at each other) down the barrel of a gun.” she wrote: “…dump the barrel of a girl.”
Also, Shakira’s Loca? I thought it was “I’m crazy about you naked” but it’s actually “I’m crazy but you like it.” I think both suit the song! Cheers.
loading...
Bee Gees.. More than a Woman, try Four Legged Woman.. Yah yah yah
loading...
Whenever I hear that Bieber Boyfriend song, I KNOW he says “I can be a gentleman” but for some reason I always think it’s “I can be a german” Haha!
PS: You have it stuck in your head now don’t you? You’re welcome.
loading...
A friend of mine was convinced that beyonce was singing “I wanna cigarette, I wanna cigarette” rather than “all the single ladies, all the single ladies” – so much so that every time I hear the song now that’s what I sing as well!
loading...
My mum thought that the lyrics to Genesis ‘Invisible Touch’ were ‘She washed her hair so Billy don’t touch it’ instead of ‘She seems to have an invisible touch, yeah’. Very close, mum…
loading...
Colin Hay – ‘Overkill’
“Goats appear and fade away…” apparently he is actually saying Ghosts.
loading...
My 4 year old daughter would sing black and gold as largengo and our favourite and her favourite song was poker face ‘kil vi va’ (he’ll see my).
loading...
Too young for Vera ….. Too low for zero
loading...
For a very long time I was singing Summer Rain as SUBMARINE… I was always wondering why they would be dancing in a submarine, but I thought it’s an old song, God knows what they were thinkng about in those days lol
loading...
My favourite one ever is “I’m still lost in Bunnings” instead of “I’m still lost and running.” Kills me.
loading...
ooh – this reminds me of a competition they had on JJJ many moons ago. They would play a snippet of an ‘Aussie Crawl’ song and you had to ring up and finish the sentence. Because James Reyne was virtually impossible to interpret, some of the things people said were hysterical. They then got stuck on one song, cant remember which one it was so they rang James Reyne and asked him and he had no idea!!
loading...
“Don’t let your egg have a stray” instead of the actual words “Don’t let your aim ever stray”
Magic-Olivia Newton John
“Mathew with a girlfriend” instead of “met you with a girlfriend”
Blondie-In the Flesh
“Everyone’s feeling pretty, it’s a Turkish Delight” instead of “Everyone’s feeling pretty, It’s hotter than July”
Masterblaster-Stevie Wonder
and I must have an ear for the word delight because,
“ex delight, enter night” instead of “exit light, enter night”.
sandman-mettallica
When I sing along to my favourite songs I just make up noises that sound like the words. For the life of me, unless I have studied the song lyrics intensely like old ABBA record sleeves, I just don’t understand what the singers are saying.
loading...
I’m still living with your goat. Everclear, Santa Monica. My daughter would be crushed if she knew he was only living with her ghost!
loading...
My 2yo when saying the lords prayer says “give us today our daddy bread”
loading...
Hot Chocolate’s, “I believe in miracles”, “You sexy thing”. My daughter thought he said, “I can see some wrinkles, you sexy thing”
I wish wrinkles were sexy!!
loading...
“She don’t like, she don’t like, she don’t like…Cooking” – Eric Clapton, Cocaine
loading...
‘Just call me angel, of the morning, angel,
Just brush my teeth before you leave me, baby…’
loading...
I thought it was “brush my teeth” too.
Just googled it and it’s “just touch my cheek”. So funny!
loading...
Someone once sang this to The Cranberries’ “Linger” and now I can’t think of it any other way:
Do you have to, do you have to, do you have to smell your finger?
loading...
My husband wondered why everyone was afraid of a “Skindy” and what the hell a ‘skindy’ actually WAS in the Stranglers “Better watch out for the Skindy” (Better watch out for the SKIN DEEP, Honey!).
I always wondered what the bloke was actually wearing as I sang “Oh, me clothes won’t let me go…oh no” which was actually “Hold me close, don’t let me go”. Tragic!
loading...
These comments have brought me to tears from laughing so hard! I used to think Grease’s “You’re the one that I want” was “You’re the walla-the-wa”. I was about 10 I think. Makes no sense!
loading...
When my son was very young and they were singing songs at Christmas, he used to sing…”holy infant, so tender and wild…”
oh, and our national anthem was sung as “..advance Australia square”…!
loading...
My daughter thought Lady Gaga was singing, “Ogre face, no you can’t touch my Ogre face!” To this day when Ever we hear Poker face the whole family sings Ogre face at the top of our lungs.
loading...
We wish you a merry Christmas now bring us some friggin’ pudding.
loading...
In Hole’s ‘Malibu’ I was convinced that that it was “oh shins of angels” not oceans.
I’ll think of more I’m sure.
loading...
History, never eat peas (History Never Repeats) – Split Enz
loading...
I want to be a door = I want to be adored (Stone Roses)
loading...
‘You’re the one that want’ from Grease was always ‘You’re the wizard of Oz’ until I was too old to admit to – WTF…
loading...
I heard that song and thought it said ‘I’m living on sexy gerkins’
loading...
This post has had my in hysterics for the past 10 minutes!
My husband always thought Kate Bush’s ‘Running Up that Hill’ went
And if I only could,
Id make a deal with god,
And get into small places – instead of ‘And I’d get him to swap our places’
Now every time I hear it I think of a teeny person squishing themselves into the gap under the fridge
loading...
Surely you’d be getting UNdressed for safe sex
loading...
‘cheap wine and a three-legged goat’ instead of ‘cheap wine and a three day growth’. Coz, you know, why not?
loading...
Cheap wine & a 3 day poke!
loading...
Cheap wine and a free bread roll……
loading...
My son as a little fellow always sang “Cheap wine and a free mango” And cried at the Midnight Oil song ‘Beds are burning’ because he thought it was the ‘birds are burning’. He became quite distraught at the idea that someone would set fire to birds!
loading...
bahaha I always thought ‘Our lips are sealed’ was ‘I love Cecile’. I always wondered who Cecile was.
loading...
‘Honest Lucille” = Our lips are sealed
loading...
Love it! I always thought this dance track was “take me to the counter club” but it’s actually “take me to the clouds above”. Lol
My sisters never let me forget it!
loading...
My brother used to sing ‘pin the baby’ to the village people’s ‘in the navy. In the same song he also used to sing ‘they want you, they want you, they want you coz you’ve done a poo!’ instead of ‘as a new recruit’
I was listening to my neighbours kids singing sexy and I know it by lmfao yesterday. The actual line is ‘I’ve got passion in my appearance and I’m not afraid to show it, show it’. The kids were singing ‘I’ve got passionfruit in my pants and I’m not afraid to throw it, throw it..’ I couldn’t breathe I was laughing so hard at them!
loading...
Lol well dont i feel stupid i thought it was ‘Passion in my pants’ not passion in my appearance….oops
loading...
I always thought it was pants too. :/
loading...
I also thought it was ‘passion in my pants’ which is bad enough, but my son started to sing ‘I’ve got a rash in my pants, and I ain’t afraid to show it’…………….it was too funny so I didn’t bother to correct him
loading...
I thought it was passion in my pants also.
loading...
Oops, I did too and would always sing those words under my breath in front of my kids. Always pictured they were singing about the junk in their trunks
loading...
I’m sure it’s I’ve got passion in my pants…..isn’t it??? appearance is too long…!!
loading...
wow, I always thought it was ‘i’ve got passion in my pants and I’m not afraid to show it’. Well, that’s what my 5 yo daughter told me they were singing!
loading...
Ha ha my friend’s daughter sings “I’m a taxi and I know it”!
loading...
I got busted by the bf singing the woollies jingle, “January, February, into Montenegro” instead of the much more sensible “into March and April” haha!
loading...
ahhh I do that too and only just realised by your comment that its march and april!!
loading...
nothing can stop these lonely tits from falling – Sinead O’Connor (Nothing Compares 2 U)
loading...
To anyone who has never seen this, some of the best ‘misheard song lyrics’ ever by a contestant on Music Idol who sung “With or Without You.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LTLEVC-sfQ
loading...
My 4 year old daughter sings “I’m on the ice and lonely” for “I’m on the edge of glory” (Lady Ga Ga) the best part is the absolute conviction she belts it out with <3
loading...
Batteries, need a charge
(Out of reach, so far) – Out of Reach, Gabrielle
Colour of my dog, colour of my dog
(Holler up my dog, holler up my dog) – Holla, Snoop Dogg
loading...
I used to sing ‘Valarie’ as in, Valarieeeee so far,you always had my heart…
loading...
Years ago I realised that the majority of my Kindergarten class were singing ‘Australians all are ostriches’ instead of ‘Australians all let us rejoice’ when singing the national anthem. This caused great hysterics at the time.
loading...
My daughter sings it that way!
loading...
OMG I used to sing it that way too in primary school LOL
loading...
Love these. Called Mondegreens after a particularly famous one. Anyway the one I remember I used to sing that made husband just about wet himself was in Metallica’s Enter Sandman. I used to sing ‘sleep with one eyed ogres’ (sleep with one eye open).
loading...
He he he, that one seriously cracked me up!! Sleep with one eyed ogres!! LOL that’s so funny!! I’m actually humming the song now
loading...
Haha! The kids at school were singing that too, then one obviously more educated kid started laughing then I had to answer parent’s questions as to why their kids were asking what a condom was? Too funny!
loading...