Misheard Song Lyrics

The Beach Boys - "Little Saint Nick" - as a kid I thought Mike Love's main vocal part was "Christmas comes this tiny cheer" instead of "Christmas comes this time each year". The former makes no sense whatsoever, but I guess it could kind of be parsed as a Lyrical Shoehorn-ism for "Christmas is here, and kids are excited about it"?

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

In "Dead Meat" by Judas Priest, I heard the line "No endless pain will change me" as "No MS Paint will change me".

One of the more infamous examples in metal is the earlier Nightwish stuff with their firts singer, had both a heavy accent and an operatic singing style that only added to muddled mess of misheard lyrics:

The big one is the opening to Wishmaster - "MASTER. APPRENTICE. HEARTBORN. SEVENTH SEEKER."

It ends up sounding like "HAMSTER. A DENTIST. HARD PORN. STEVEN SEGAL."

"If I reach for the stars, you can't hold me back"

Twilight Zone by Golden Earring I don't know which is real lyrics or not because I heard conflicting lyrics.

"Help I'm stepping into the Twilight Zone this place is a madhouse feels like being cloned, My beacons get moved under moon and star"

I heard "It feels light I'm stepping into the Twilight Zone this place is a madhouse feels like being home, My feet they can't move under moon and star"

Also later in the song I heard "See he was gone we know when the bullet hits the bone"

It is actually suppose to be "Soon you will come to know when the bullet hits the bone"

edited 15th Dec '14 6:24:22 PM by Halberdier17

Batman Ninja more like Batman's Bizarre Adventure

Maybe not quite a mondegreen, because homonyms, but I just now figured out that in "All I Want For Christmas Is You", Mariah Carey says she won't stay up to "hear the magic reindeer click" (as in the sound flying reindeer might make on a rooftop), not "hear the magic reindeer clique". I mean, they wouldn't let Rudolph join in on their reindeer games, that sort of sounds like a clique. I now think Magic Reindeer Clique is sort of a Good Name For A Rock Band, providing they were Christmas-themed somehow.

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

Chris Cornell's "Seasons" has the line "And the naked floor is cold as hell", and I misheard "the naked floor is" as "the naked florist".

I thought that the chorus Stone Temple Pilots song, "Dead and Bloated" was:

"Ohhhh Yeahhh! Existential Statue of!"

"You can't swallow what I'm thinking!!"

In Megadeth's "Take No Prisoners", the gang shout near the end of "Take no shit!" sounds like they're saying "Techno Shit!"

The lyrics I've found on the internet are split about this one, so I might not have misheard it.

"Oh, I don't know what's real" (what I hear) versus "Oh, I don't know what I feel" in When You Sleep, by My Bloody Valentine.

Before I knew the name of the song I didn't know the lyrics to Man on a Silver Mountain by Rainbow.

The chorus says "I'm the man on a mountain, man on a silver mountain"

I heard "I'm the man on a mountain, the man on a shin of a mountain"

Batman Ninja more like Batman's Bizarre Adventure

For some reason, I was remembering a childhood one for "Puff The Magic Dragon" - I thought Puff was frolicking in "the ottomis", instead of "the autumn mist". I knew that wasn't an actual word, I just figured The Ottomis was an imaginary place in the song (I guess The Ottomis would be a region within the land called Honah Lee, then).

edited 18th Mar '15 10:57:47 PM by MikeK

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

"Kiss (When The Sun Don't Shine)" by the Vengaboys-

My misheard lyrics: I wanna kiss, kiss, kiss when the sun goes down

Real lyrics: I only kiss, kiss, kiss when the sun don't shine

Granted, I didn't know the real title of the song when I first misheard those lyrics.

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Don't think I need to mention this, right?

One I heard from someone else, and now always think of when I hear the song: Someone on a Weezer message board spoke of hearing "Why Bother" without knowing the title first, and wondering why Rivers Cuomo's dad would beat him up for being dumped by a girl - "My father / is gonna hurt me / is gonna kill when you desert me" ^note instead of "Why bother / it's gonna hurt me / it's gonna kill when you desert me". My personal Weezer mondegreen is in "Pink Triangle": "My mind begins the orange mess" instead of "My mind begins the arrangements" - it's partially due to how they emphasize the last syllable of "arrangements".

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

Megadeth's 'The Conjuring' - Most of the song is pretty incomprehensible, due to both the production and the way Dave Mustaine "sings" like he has a mouthful of cotton, but in particular the line "I've got your soul" sounds to me like "Hot Buttered Soul".

edited 5th Apr '15 6:28:03 AM by djbj

In The Police's "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic", I at first heard "I resolve to call her up" as "I resolve to cholera"

Listening to "Digital Bitch" by Black Sabbath the other day, I heard "She's got more money than I've ever seen" as "She's got more money than a limousine". Which amused me because my mondegreen almost makes sense while still being pretty ridiculous. It made me imagine that Ian Gillan was somehow convinced that "limousine" was a synonym for "very wealthy person", instead of a vehicle that a very wealthy person would travel in.

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

Some Fall Out Boy:

"This Ain't A Scene (It's a Goddamn Arms Race)" What they actually said:

What I heard

Basically, before I actually read the lyrics, I thought it was a Bond Villain personal ad.

"Centuries" What they said:

What I Heard

Reminds me of an old commercial about mixed drinks taking forever to make.

edited 4th May '15 11:27:42 AM by VerityCandle

Have a great day everyone!

Champagne Supernova:

I heard:

Actual lyrics:

Batman Ninja more like Batman's Bizarre Adventure

I think I like your mondegreen better than the actual lyric. Also, my coworker once told me about how he used to think the title drop was "champagne souping over", which he took to mean a glass of champagne was overflowing.

edited 6th May '15 9:21:17 PM by MikeK

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

In the chorus of "Not Going Away" by Ozzy, the lyric is:

What I hear is "All your time has turned to sand." I found that a lot cleverer. Like messing with Ozzy is such a waste of time that it's the equivalent of watching sand in an hourglass falling.

The actual lyric implies Ozzy is just so hard that diamonds shatter before him. Sounds kinda goofy, honestly (coming from him).

edited 11th May '15 8:06:41 PM by Alucard

Heh heh, "hard".

Peace is the only battle worth waging.

There's also this part to "Implode" by Slayer (a song from their upcoming album) where Tom is saying "Standing room only all the world will attend / Front row center to the ultimate end"

Not a bad lyric, but I actually thought he was saying "Standing at the scene proceeding World War 10 / From World War 7 to the ultimate end."

Just imagine how screwed up the world would have to be for 6 world wars to pass by with us still preparing to fight the next, and it sounds exactly like the kind of grizzly picture Slayer love to paint with their lyrics.

edited 12th May '15 2:43:48 AM by Alucard

Until just now, I thought "Smooth" by Santana and Rob Thomas had the line "It's the stainless steel emotion that I get from you" - it turns out to be "It's the same as the emotion that I get from you". I have no idea what kind of emotion could be compared to stainless steel, but it sounds cooler than the actual lyric.

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.

"Summertime Sadness" came on the radio today at work - I thought a line of the song was "all sizzling like a snail", which gave me this gross but evocative image of it being so hot that the pavement was cooking snails. A coworker claimed it was "all sizzling like a snare", which makes even less sense, though I guess I can maybe see a drum machine snare beat sounding like something sizzling in a pan. It turns out both of us are wrong and it's "all sizzling like your stare" ^note That, or he actually did say "stare" and I misheard both him and the song.

edited 6th Jul '15 7:22:04 PM by MikeK

Earth is the only planet inhabitable by Nicolas Cage.