#mishearing songs

[phoenixyfriend]

Just misheard a song

What they said: sailors What I heard: Seders

What they said: and they’re on leave What I heard: in a tree

The line: It's two sailors and they're on leave.

What I imagined: Two Seders' worth of of Orthodox Jews in the branches of a large apple tree.

[joltning]

so… misheard lyrics huh

[gooperts-gunk]

i was keyword searching on twitter and someone gave me a horrifying realization. i know we all have our theories about the green growing on q!bbh. he looks at green and calls it blue. but do you remember all the little tunes he sings randomly.......?

*slow dramatic terrified turn* HE'S BLUE IF HE WAS GREEN HE WOULD DIE IF HE WAS GREEN HE WOULD DIE IF HE WAS GREEN HE WOULD DIE

I DON'T HAVE A REACTION IMAGE I NEEDED TO DRAW MY OWN

[mackmp3]

Radiohead, in rainbows disk 2, song 6, first line.

thom yorke doctor who reference real??

[dealilcats]

Randomly relistened to the sistina audio yesterday, I caught a few mistakes I'd made, and realised when they're trying to convince Gus of doing the Rumpus Cat thing again, I'm fairly sure that when he agrees he says something along the lines of "vediamo se siete bravi", "let's see if you can do it" because the kittens have to play the dogs!

That phrase in italian is a very endearing/sweet way of telling a child "alright, lets see you do it". Like a challenge, but you already know whatever they do will be fine.

Gus trusts that they'll do fine in the play.

I'm losing my mind.

[mogoce-nocoj]

"here's another heartbreak song but this time it's us who fucked up, okay? and now we have to make the worst phone call of our lives. here's ne bi smel"

I didn't exactly catch what he said but what the actual fuck. so it really was about the band all along huh oh my god

(edit: still not sure if he meant us as in the pov of the song or us as in the band got a bit too excited lmao)

[vanweezer]

not bisexual but i do respect the culture 💗💜💙

[babykittenteach]

I respect everyone who went with Kate Bush more than I respect myself, but in honor of the song that became my inexplicable top song of the year: jumpsuits.

[edge-oftheworld]

no but sugar coated pain is such a good line why did it take me six years to actually hear it

[hjbender]

I think this may break my current record for "Longest I've Gone Without Knowing the Name/Artist of a Song".

Sometime in the late 90s, I was listening to my local rock station (99X, 99.7 FM) and recording songs onto tape. A song came on with a rocking base line and synthesizer, later joined by drums and lead guitars. No lyrics (that I could understand). And of course the DJ never tells you the name of the song afterward, but he's happy to talk over the first 30 seconds of it.

As is the case with most instrumental music, it's difficult to describe a song unless you can hum it. And I could not hum this one. It was too weird.

So I spent the next twenty-fiveish years in a state of maddening non-consensual ignorance. The era of tapes ended, and though I still have mine stashed away, the tapes themselves are wearing out and already sounding pretty bad. I don't listen to them but maybe once every ten years, so I had forgotten all about the song.

Until earlier this year, when I was watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos (1980). The song playing in the background of this scene from Episode 09 "The Lives of the Stars" is the one I'm talking about:

When I heard it, I launched out of my chair faster than you could say "billions and billions". Finally! I had a piece of the song! ...but it still wasn't doing me any good. Was there a site I could run it through to identify the song? Would some kind stranger on Reddit possibly solve my dilemma? Disheartened, I put it on the back burner.

A few months passed. Then, a few days ago, as I was looking up something related to Cosmos, I came across a website—a wonderful, wonderful website—that had the complete soundtrack of Cosmos listed out in excruciating detail, every little clip and soundbite.

I bookmarked it because I'd forgotten which episode my mystery song was on and needed to go back and search. Sigh.

Well, I finally got around to it tonight. By sheer luck I found the episode almost immediately, and at long last, I finally have a name and artist.

[steelthroat]

It's funny when I hear songs in English and I blatantly mishear and misinterpret the lyrics while it keeps maintaining some meaning like-

Walk by Sam Tinnez, there was a verse I always understood as "I cannot belong with the mountains. I gotta keep moving [...]"

And in the beginning, I was perplexed because what does this even mean? But then I thought about it. The song is basically "I keep moving, nothing can stop me" Ok? So it makes sense that the protagonist of the song is saying "I cannot be part of the mountains (something great, powerful, etc but static, mountains don't move, they change with time, but they don't walk) but I gotta keep moving.

Like "I'm not made for greatness, but I'm projected towards the future" (movement and future and symbolism)

So okay that's the meaning, cool right?

NO.

The song says " like Hannibal over the mountains, I gotta keep moving..."

AND ALL THE THINKING AND INTERPRETATION GOES DOWN THE DRAIN BECAUSE NOW THE MEANING CHANGES COMPLETELY RAAAAAAAAAAAH.

Hannibal. The historical figure. Someone just as great as the mountains. RAAAAAAAAAAAH.

[calliettes-posts]

In another episode of Am I Going Deaf:

I thought Billie sang, "Nothing left to lose but my baby," turns out it's "Nothing left to lose without my baby"

[barn-dawg]

spotify will add absolutley nothing new to their serivce and up the price each year anyway

[bloodenjoyer]

oh my god my entire life i thought the lyrics to life on mars was "oh man look at those gay men go" and i just kinda rolled with it

[lottieurl]

omg it's actually so sick of online love

[the-raindeer-king]

Lost my mind at work today because my favorite band ever (Mother Mother, for anyone interested) played on the radio and I genuinely thought I was losing it because I couldn't figure out why the beat was so familiar until the vocals started, and then I got so excited I forgot the lyrics lmao