When you were a kid and listened to a song, what did you get totally wrong about it?

I thought that Supertramp's The Logical Song was sung by a computer or a robot of some kind.

 

Another I misheard at the age of about 14 was in "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" as it begins..."I look at you all, see the loved pervert sleeping".
Hey it was the Beatles! Who was I to think that's not what it was??

 

IMO, Ben was a much better singer than Rick.

 

It wasn't just kids - plenty of adults didn't get it either. I remember how much my best friend's super-conservative mom loved the Village People - if only she'd known!

 

Not lyrics, but for a long while, I thought Brian Wilson co-wrote Pet Sounds with Peter Asher...

 

For a long time I thought "Paint it Black" was a Doors song.

 

That's perfectly plausible. I could see how you would think that.

 

No, no, that was "Hi Hi Hi".

 

I still do

 

Black group:

 

Our house is a very very very find house with two cats and a dog, life isn't very hard...

Who are you - The Who (Blue Auning, blue blue blue blue)

Thought Steely Dan was a solo artist

Livin Thing - ELO (I'm takin a dump) dive

 

When The Beatles released 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' I was seven years old and (because of the nice tune and the rhythm) I thought it was the coziest, happy-go-lucky song ever.
It was not until I got older and learned English (which is not my first language) that I realized that the song is really about some rotten nutcase who is running around killing people just because he does not like them.
I liked the tune a lot as a kid but when I grew up I learned that apparently 'Maxwell' is one of the earliest songs in the McCartney canon which is regarded as 'bad-taste' (whatever that is) and the kind of song he later filled up an endless string of solo albums with.
I wish I had remained a kid....

 

"No man kneels to flies on my s**t"

- KE9/3rd

 

Let's see here's a few lyrics that I sung out loud wrong for like forever until a wise man told me otherwise.

Kiss- I use to think he was singing, "I'm the King Of the nighttime world, an your my Midnight Queen". The actual lyric is "And your my HEADLIGHT Queen". My Lyric is better.

Van Halen- On "Unchained" I use to think the lyric said, "Till I got a BACK city address". The actual lyric is "FAT" city address. Again, mine is better.

A lastly, "Your So Vain". First I never knew what "Gavotee" even meant, let alone how to pronounce it. I was always to lazy to even look it up. And another line I sung forever wrong up until the internet came along "Some underworld spy or a wife of a "Postman, wife of a Postman" lol. It's actually "wife of a close friend, wife of a close friend".

 

And even more surprising for me was when I learned how many tracks Jerry actually sung lead on post Freedom of Choice. Growing up I always thought Mark sang lead on everything. But Jerry does:

Six tracks on New Traditionalists plus shared lead on Through Being Cool - so 7/10.
Four tracks on Oh, No! It's Devo - 4/11
Six tracks on Shout - 6/10
Only two on Total Devo - 2/12 (only count Some Things Never Change once)
Five on Smooth Noodle Maps including shared lead on Stuck in a Loop - 5/11
Ten on Something for Everybody including shared lead on What We Do - 10/16

I think it took me almost longer to be able to distinguish between Ben and Ric's voices.

 

I have to agree. I had the PB version on this LP and it must have been one of the first albums I ever owned.



Cringeworthy sleeve, looking back on it (plus 10 tracks per side won't make it sound wonderful) but I've always got it in the back of my mind to grab a copy again if ever I see it and I'm sure to, sometime. It was wonderful, to the 10 year old me. http://www.discogs.com/Various-20-Of-Another-Kind/release/1734376

 

The very first time I heard INXS' "Elegantly Wasted" on the radio, I thought they were singing "I'm living in a basement".

 

When I was young, I heard Mr. Tambourine Man sung by The Byrds, and was told in passing that it was written by Bob Dylan. All I knew about Dylan was that he was "serious" and his songs had meanings.

I then heard the song Green Tambourine, and incorrectly thought THAT was Bob Dylan and that the lyrics were filled with deeper meaning.

 

The first time I heard the blues, it scared the [expletive deleted] out of me. Now I can't get enough of it.

 

I remember a kid singing-I'm not Joe Pepitone.(I'm not your stepping stone) at a department store...Joe Pepitone played for the NY Yankees...

 

On The Reels cover of Here Today it's credited to Brian Wilson and Peter Asher

 

Sometime around 1962, I would have been six years old, I was riding in the car with my dad and the radio played Bruce Channel "Hey Baby" and then Muddy Waters "Mannish Boy". I was not ready.

 

While I got many lyrics wrong when I was a kid, even when I got the lyrics right, I took them very literally and didn't catch on to the sarcasm, irony and allusion that was often present. It all just went over my head.

 

One of my favorite Beatle songs is "Good Morning,Good Morning"
John sang:
"Somebody needs to know the time
Glad that I'm here "
I thought he was singing "Blast the time gear" . Still kinda like it that way

 

As most people Blinded by the light.. always though he was saying Douche.....

Springsteen's 10th Avenue Freeze out I always though it was saying "the devil in these eyes"

And I don't care what Carly Simon says I still think that song is about him......