Mondegreens

Ghoti · #1 Jul 31, '08, 6:32 am

No, not a drug store...

"Mondegreens" are misheard lyrics in a song, the ones you go blithely and innocently singing (wondering all the while why people are laughing at you), until some charitable soul finally points out why.

Some woman (I forget her name) coined the word "Mondegreen" from a misheard lyric of her childhood, that went:

They hae slain the Earl Amurray, [sic]
And Lady Mondegreen.

(The actual last line is "And laid him on the green.")

"'Scuse me, while I kiss this guy..." (misheard from Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze": "'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky...") is a classic of the genre.

Anyone have any mondegreens from their past?

I'll start:

I had just started school when Sesame Street first aired; I remember the second part of the opening theme, which goes:

"Come and play,
Everything's A-OK,
Friendly neighbours there,
That's where we meet..."

I heard the last couplet as:

"Friendly neighbours there
That swear at me..."

My poor little JK ears were scandalized!

Catholictrain · #2 Jul 31, '08, 8:08 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ghoti

No, not a drug store...

"Mondegreens" are misheard lyrics in a song, the ones you go blithely and innocently singing (wondering all the while why people are laughing at you), until some charitable soul finally points out why.

Some woman (I forget her name) coined the word "Mondegreen" from a misheard lyric of her childhood, that went:

They hae slain the Earl Amurray, [sic]
And Lady Mondegreen.

(The actual last line is "And laid him on the green.")

"'Scuse me, while I kiss this guy..." (misheard from Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze": "'Scuse me, while I kiss the sky...") is a classic of the genre.

Anyone have any mondegreens from their past?

I'll start:

I had just started school when Sesame Street first aired; I remember the second part of the opening theme, which goes:

"Come and play,
Everything's A-OK,
Friendly neighbours there,
That's where we meet..."

I heard the last couplet as:

"Friendly neighbours there
That swear at me..."

My poor little JK ears were scandalized!

Not a song, but a classic is "... give us this day, our jelly bread..." from the Our Father.

Mary Gail 36 · #3 Jul 31, '08, 8:08 am

Boyd, the wiggling millipede.

From All in the Family.

Should be:

Boy, the way Glen Miller played.

Silly me.

Also thee is this pop dance song out now. I thought it was

Are you gonna fix it, fix it, fix it....I wanna sandwich.

It's actually:

Are you gonna fix it, fix it, fix it....my heart is damaged.

Ghoti · #4 Jul 31, '08, 10:08 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mary Gail 36

Boyd, the wiggling millipede.

From All in the Family.

Should be:

Boy, the way Glen Miller played.

Silly me.

Gosh, I remember for the longest time trying to figure out what the second-last line was:

"Gee, our old LaSalle ran great..."

And no one I knew understood it either. I thought it sounded like,

"G.R.O., a sour red grape."

Ghoti · #5 Jul 31, '08, 10:13 am

In the Beatles song "Across the Universe", there's aline in Sanskrit:

"Jai guru deva om".

I thought it sounded like

"Kangaroo days, love". When I listened closer, and heard the "j" sound of the first word, I decided it was

"Jackaroo days, love."

Although that made no sense, neither did "I am the egg-man, I am the walrus, Koo-koo-ca-choo."

Ghoti · #6 Sep 5, '08, 5:16 pm

Bump.

Cavaille-Coll · #7 Sep 5, '08, 5:35 pm

In the Andrew's Sisters song, "Rum and Coca-Cola," there was the line "Like the Yankee girl, the native swoon when she hear der Bingle croon," referring to Bing Crosby. What I heard was "when she hear the wrinkled prune."

CTA1967 · #8 Sep 5, '08, 5:37 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ghoti

Koo-koo-ca-choo."

Actually, I think that would be Simon & Garfunkel. The Beatles would be "goo goo ga joob".

FickleFreckled · #9 Sep 5, '08, 6:01 pm

Silent Night, Holy Night, all is calm, all is bright
Round John Virgin, mother and child...
(That's the chubby shepherd to the left of Joseph)

Our Father Who art in Heaven, Howard be thy name.

the phoenix · #10 Sep 5, '08, 9:59 pm

Dashing through the snow
In a one horse, soap, and sleigh ...

FickleFreckled · #11 Sep 5, '08, 10:24 pm

In the Phil Collins song "That's All", I thought the line "livin' with you's justa putting me through it all a the time" was 'livin' with you's just a pretty mean phooey all a the time'

It described a relationship I was in quite well and I've used "pretty mean phooey" ever since...

Lamb Serenade · #12 Sep 5, '08, 10:54 pm

Oh my! Thank you so much for this thread! I really needed to smile right now!

Thanks, and thanks and thanks again...

FickleFreckled · #13 Sep 6, '08, 8:54 am

Ooh! Ooh! I remember another one. I don't actually remember doing it, I must have been really small, but it was a story my mother used to tell:

The real lyrics were
Cross Over the bridge
Cross over the bridge
Leave your fickle past behind you...

My version was
Cross over the bridge
Cross over the bridge
Leave the milkman behind you...

(No wonder my dad always look at me strangely...)

CindiA · #14 Sep 6, '08, 10:51 am

Lucy in disguise with diamonds. (It took years before I knew that Lucy wasn't running around incognito!)

And what about that whole "I Can't Get No Satisfaction" song by The Rolling Stones????? Did anybody EVER get the lyrics right on that one? I can't even write here what I thot it said!!

FickleFreckled · #15 Sep 6, '08, 11:14 am

I remember that "Can't Get No Satisfaction" thing -
we'd go around singing something like, "aa I aa o er en I babybaby come back..."