Misheard Lyrics Fun!

I used to think it was that too!

Another one I had trouble working out was the line in It's Going to Take Sometime which says "Like the young trees in the winter time, I'll learn how to bend" I couldn't work out what the second bit was!

I thought it was "Like the young trees in the winter time, haven't had a..." something!

I read one online years ago where someone thought the line in All You Get From Love is a Love Song was... "The best love songs are written with a broken arm!"
 
I could never work out one particular line of I Can’t Make Music, which I thought was:

“A note’s a note cliche to say I feel I’m gonna die”

...which makes absolutely no sense at all!
 
It might not be the Carps, but when I was 7 years old, I thought the Billy Joel lyric was, (omg this is so embarrassing), "You had the dog hair and yawning your hand and a spoon up your nose. lololololol.
 
I became a fan at the age of 10, before I spoke English. So this is not so much mishearing but more a case of misinterpreting: “hanging around, nothing to do but frown”. My mother used to call curtains “hangings”’when she started to learn English, and so the 10 year old me thought Karen was singing about being in dark room with the curtains closed...!
 
Add me to the pile of "All You Get from Love is a Love Song" mis-hearers.

"Because the best love songs'll reel you with a broken heart".

For shame...

Ed
 
I always hear "You can do me in" rather than "deal me in" in Happy and "don't love me if what you intend" rather than "don't love me for what you intend" in Love Me For what I Am.

Non-Carpenters songs where my wife has had to correct me (after looking at me as if I were mad): "Street light its the only light I know" (Street Life) and "Hot dog jumping frog have a cookie" rather than "Hot dog jumping frog Albuquerque" in Prefab Sprout's King of Rock n Roll.
 
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I always hear "You can do me in" rather than "deal me in" in Happy

Me too 100%! One of the few occasions where Karen’s phrasing was so clipped it made the lyrics ambiguous.

"don't love me if what you intend" rather than "don't love me for what you intend" in Love Me For what I Am.

There’s no way she sings the word “for” in that line. And I’ve heard that song countless times over the early years of my obsession. What you’re hearing is the right lyrics, although to me it doesn’t make sense grammatically.
 
How about "Man on the rug" rather than "Band on the Run" by Paul McCartney. And then there is the lesser-known album track by Chris Isaak "Except the New Girl" which I always hear "except the nude girl." The mis-heard lyric actually makes more sense in that song.
 
The ones that are really tough often times are backing vocal lyrics because they're not only 'in the background,' but often times doubled or triple tracked, making the enunciation even more difficult to decipher.

A perfect example of this is in Piano Picker! On the second half where Richard sings the line:

LEAD: "Yes, after years and years of practice..................And awful allergies that made me sneeze"
BACKING VOCAL: "HANON, CZERNY AND BACH"
 
The ones that are really tough often times are backing vocal lyrics because they're not only 'in the background,' but often times doubled or triple tracked, making the enunciation even more difficult to decipher.

A perfect example of this is in Piano Picker! On the second half where Richard sings the line:

LEAD: "Yes, after years and years of practice..................And awful allergies that made me sneeze"
BACKING VOCAL: "HANON, CZERNY AND BACH"

You know; I FORGOT about Piano Picker and always wondering what he was saying in the background! Thanks for that. I can die now.
 
Me too 100%! One of the few occasions where Karen’s phrasing was so clipped it made the lyrics ambiguous.



There’s no way she sings the word “for” in that line. And I’ve heard that song countless times over the early years of my obsession. What you’re hearing is the right lyrics, although to me it doesn’t make sense grammatically.

I've always heard "if" as well and thought Karen had got it wrong - as you say it makes no sense grammatically. However, there are people out there who hear "for". I can just about here "for" in the first chorus if I really try hard to, but I can't the second time round - I hear "if".
 
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