Huh? Play it again: Misheard and nonsense song lyrics

There are so many stories we hear that are completely genuine but would seem far fetched and preposterous in a film or a book.

The adage of truth eclipsing fiction popped into my head recently when I had a real chuckle while reading a list of song lyrics people get completely wrong with their own bizarre alternative words.

Some of my favourites are food themed misheard lyrics such as the Eurythmics “Sweet dreams are made of cheese”, The Beatles “I want to hold your ham” and Dire Straits “Money for nothing and your chips for free” which sounds a cracking deal to me.

If you need more food for thought, there’s Paul Young’s “Every time you go away, you take a piece of meat with you.” and the line in Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody “Spare him his life from this monstrosity” being mistakenly heard as “Saving his life from this warm sausage tea.”

Other non food howlers are Hot Chocolate’s “I remove umbilicals” instead of “I believe in miracles” in “You Sexy Thing”, Abba’s “See that girl, watch her scream, kicking the dancing queen”, Bon Jovi’s “It doesn’t make a difference if we’re naked or not” rather than: “It doesn’t make a difference if we make it or not”, Queen’s “Kicking your cat all over the place” instead of “kicking your can” and The Monkees “Then I saw her face, now I’m gonna leave her.” And who can forget Peter Kay comically pointing out Sister Sledge singing: “Just let me staple the vicar” rather than “Just let me state for the record”?

Let’s face it, we’ve all done it - enthusiastically sung along to a song only to have someone howling with laughter at us.

When I was at school, I remember singing Madonna’s “La Isla Bonita” about the “young girl with eyes like potatoes” only to have my best friend in absolute stitches. She informed me I’d totally goofed the lyrics which were actually: “young girl with eyes like pesetas.”

Turns out we were both mistaken as the line is in fact: “young girl with eyes like the desert.”

Just recently, another friend confessed to initially thinking Adele’s hit song “Set Fire To The Rain” was called “Set fire to Lorraine”. Poor Lorraine.

My first ever job was a Saturday job in a store’s music department. However, one day I was stumped when a customer asked if we had anything by “The Saw Doctors”. After checking the CDs alphabetically, I told him no, but my boss said we did.

I’d been looking for “The Sore Doctors.” Ouch.

But in a classic case of real life beating make believe, if you listen carefully, you’ll realise there’s many popular songs with actual completely bonkers lyrics.

When there’s so many nonsensical lyrics out there, is it any wonder we don’t bat an eyelid when we get the words of songs totally wrong and don’t even question why they don’t make sense.

Take Blondie’s Rapture. Now that is what I call a tune. But the words are total gibberish. “And out comes a man from Mars, and you try to run, but he’s got a gun. And he shoots you dead and he eats your head. And then you’re in the man from Mars. You go out at night, eatin’ cars, you eat Cadillacs, Lincolns too, Mercurys and Sabarus …” WHAT?!!

As for people getting the words to Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody wrong, the actual words don’t make any more sense: “I see a little silhouetto of a man, Scaramouche, Scaramouche, will you do the Fandango, Thunderbolt and lightning, very very frightening, Galileo, Galileo …” Yes. Quite.

Then there’s Prefab Sprout’s “The King of Rock ‘n’ Roll” - “Hot dog, Jumping frog, Albuquerque.” And you thought Crazy Frog was crazy.

Shakira is just as bad in “Wherever, Whenever”. “Lucky that my breasts are small and humble, So you don’t confuse them with mountains.”

Yes, I’m sure that’s a common problem for big breasted women. “Is that Mount Everest? Oh no, wait - I think it’s actually just some boobs.”

Des’ree comes across as completely crackers in her song “Life”. “I don’t wanna see a ghost. It’s the sight that I fear most. I’d rather have a piece of toast.” Wouldn’t we all Des’ree.

Do not even get me started on The Beatles “I Am The Walrus.”