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I’ve written about mondegreens, or misheard lyrics, and I’ve also posted on misheard words – (where you guys had some fun with “Blinded by the Light”) and somewhere I wrote a post commenting on lyrics with poor grammar (What if God WERE one of us…) – but what about lyrics you know are correct but still don’t make a lick of sense?
For instance, I know Robert Plant and Jimmy Page did a lot of drugs in the 70s (shhhh, they say they didn’t in one of their biographies), but, honestly folks:
If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now, it’s just a spring clean for the May queen…
Then there was Yes, who, before breaking up and reforming for the billionth time, released “I’ve Seen All Good People:”
I’ve seen all good people turn their heads each day
so satisfied I’m on my way.
Okay, I can sorta-kiiinda wrap my head around that one, (something about death/suicide, perhaps?) but then later I really must protest:
‘Cause it’s time, it’s time in time with your time and its news is captured
For the queen to use.
Again with the queen!
Now I’m sure one of you loyal Wrap readers is smarter than I am and will drop a comment explaining the meaning of either or both of these songs. (PLEASE do!) Meanwhile, got a lyric that doesn’t make sense to you? Go ahead and vent!
Comments (45)
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In The Shins’ song New Slang, there’s this lyric I’ve never been able to figure out. Any insights out there?
God speed all the bakers at dawn,
may they all cut their thumbs,
And bleed into their buns ’till they melt away.
posted by Seth on 8-10-2007 at 4:04 am
from interpol:
“I want your silent parts
The parts the birds love
I know there’s such a place.”
and from the decemberists:
“Or are you furrowed like a lioness…”
neither of these make sense to me.
posted by jenni on 8-10-2007 at 5:52 am
Ok. My interpretations as a Yes fan.
“I’ve seen all good people turn their heads each day so satisfied I’m on my way” I kind of think is about people turning the other cheek and ignoring others to satisfy their own needs. Which brings us to the majority of the song (”Your Move”) that follows, using the metaphor of a chess game, in which the goal is to capture everything your opponent has for your own gain, your main goal to be to capture what is MOST precious to your opponent (the royalty)…coming back to the turning of the head for your satisfaction. I think the song is sung from the POV of the diagonal piece since it says “move me on to any black square” and the queen in your quote is now clearly the queen in the game of chess. But I think the moral of the song comes with the line “Just remember that the goal is for all to capture all we want.” Now, I don’t know exactly what this commentary is on, be it the selfishness of relationships, or selfishness of war (Yes liked to write deep commentary on things like Vietnam), but I do know that it is a metaphor with Chess, and that it is probably some sort of commentary on self-gain and neglect of others. I hope this maybe helps or sounds the least bit sensible.
posted by Sami on 8-10-2007 at 5:58 am
I’ve been trying forever to figure out what the heck is going on in “The Weight” by The Band. But now I’ve just checked Wikipedia, and the at the bottom of the page for this song, there’s a link to an extensive analysis of every verse. Go Internet!
posted by Karen on 8-10-2007 at 6:08 am
As soon as I saw your headline, I thought of Yes. Just last year, I bought a used CD of Fragile that had lyrics. I checked out every song, thinking I’d learn something new, but they were all just as nonsensical as I had thought. Still love their music.
posted by Miss Cellania on 8-10-2007 at 6:24 am
“If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now, it’s just a spring clean for the May queen…”
If the May Queen was spring cleaning in YOUR yard, don’t you think her broom would rustle a few leaves in your bushes?
That’s always been one of my favorite lines from Stairway; it always conjures up, for me at least, catching a quick glimpse of Titania out of the corner of my eye, peeking out at me from between the leaves.
posted by Adelwolf on 8-10-2007 at 7:14 am
How about “The roots of love lay all around/but for me they come a tumblin’ down,” from “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted”? No wonder his love departed–having to dodge tumblin’ roots would get old pretty quickly.
Or: “The fishing boats/with their sails afloat” out on Blue Bayou…What a magificent sight. (Maybe the fishermen are using those sails as nets…they wouldn’t do much good up the mast, on a bayou, I wouldn’t think.)
posted by Mark Gallo on 8-10-2007 at 8:02 am
I love it to death, but I don’t understand [insert Bob Dylan's oeuvre here].
posted by Joe Mc on 8-10-2007 at 8:11 am
Whether the song is mine or someone else’s, my favorite parts have always been the lines that create images in conjunction with the music. The literal interpretation doesn’t matter. It just sounds right or feels right &, most likely, that’s the end of the analysis for the person who writes it.
posted by DW on 8-10-2007 at 8:11 am
Yes has a million of ‘em. My fave:
In and around the lake
Mountains come out of the sky
And they stand there
Okay, maybe that does makes sense…a little too much sense.
posted by Average Jane on 8-10-2007 at 8:21 am
The entirety of Procol Harum’s “Whiter Shade of Pale”.
Back when it was first released my friends and I would sit around for hours, usually under the influence of controlled substances, and discuss the meaning of the lyrics.
Many, many moons later I was reading an interview in Rolling Stone with the writer of the song (can’t remember his name) and the interviewer asked him what it meant. His reply? “Didn’t mean anything, I just liked the way the words fir together.”
Second on the list, The Beatles’ “I am the Walrus”.
posted by Doc on 8-10-2007 at 8:22 am
“MacArthur Park is melting in the dark
All the sweet, green icing flowing down
Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don’t think that I can take it
‘Cause it took so long to bake it
And I’ll never have that recipe again
Oh, no! ”
I just don’t get it.
posted by AllisonW on 8-10-2007 at 8:28 am
One of my favorites, which makes sense but wasn’t necessarily well thought through is Jailbreak by Thin Lizzy:
“Tonight there’s going to be a jailbreak/ Somewhere in this town.”
Um, perhaps at the jail?
posted by Andrew on 8-10-2007 at 8:43 am
There are many old Willie songs that make sense, but are a mess when it comes to syntax. How about this, from “Mama, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” –
“And them that don’t know him won’t like him
And them that do sometimes won’t know how to take him
He ain’t wrong he’s just different
but his pride won’t let him do things to make you think he’s right.”
(I’d hate to have to diagram all that.)
posted by buddz on 8-10-2007 at 9:44 am
from bruce springsteen (back when he had a last name)
cut loose like a deuce another runner in the night
posted by max on 8-10-2007 at 10:14 am
Beck is the King of Lyrics That Don’t Make Sense. Here’s a sample from the song “Cyanide Breathmint”…
in the afternoon
riding the scapegoat
burning equipment
decomposing
cool off your jets
take off your sweats
I got a funny feeling they got plastic in the afterlife
posted by Ed on 8-10-2007 at 10:17 am
Steely Dan, a literate band if there ever was one, gives one of the best examples of a dangling modifier in their song “Reeling in the Years”:
“You’ve been telling me you were a genius since you were seventeen, after all the years I’ve known you I still don’t know what you mean.”
So, did she become a genius at 17? Or was she always a genius but only informed the narrator of this when she was 17?
Yes, I know the latter is the obvious answer, but I always like to think it refers to a “Flowers for Algernon” situation.
posted by Daylightrambler on 8-10-2007 at 10:22 am
Ryan Adams in “Firecracker”
“Black bird, slow and softly, breaks a glass of wine…”
posted by b.n. on 8-10-2007 at 11:31 am
“‘Cause it’s time, it’s time in time with your time and its news is captured
For the queen to use.”
So the general public time is in sync with your personal time (your doing awesome in a way that is timely, everyone can see), and it’s newsworthy, so even the queen knows about it…?
I think using the queen as the figure not only shows a power figure, but possibly a scarier, behind the scenes power, possibly more threatening to the male voice?
Or it’s because of Alice in Wonderland.
posted by Steph on 8-10-2007 at 12:02 pm
For my eldest daughter and son (now 31 and 26) that line from Fragile was always “Llamas come out of the sky in December.” The younger ones were sure it was “Mammoths come out of the sky”, but they agreed with the older ones that it was in december.
Yes was famous for songs of intricate complexity and beautiful melodic lines (all the way to their bass lines) but never for the comprehension that came from listening to their lyrics. The closest I know of them ever being understandable was when they did covers like “Tonight” from West Side Story or “America” (which was written by Paul Simon and I first heard on his “Old Friends, Bookends” album.) Lots of metaphorical images, but all fragmented, a thought kaleidescope to keep that side of your brain busy while the other side enjoyed the music!
posted by Ray Brohinsky on 8-10-2007 at 12:17 pm
Yes’s “Your Move” is about war through the eyes of chess. “Don’t surround yourself with yourself” is a clever double entendre, because it refers to the chess principle of keeping pieces away from your king, and at the same time it refers to the life principle of not surrounding yourself with like minded people. The only line that never made sense to me was “Send an instant karma to me/Initial it with loving care (Don’t surround yourself)”. Wikipedia has a great lead, but I can’t verify it now: Alan White was John Lennon’s drummer for his song Instant Karma in 1970, and Alan supposedly joined up with Yes the following year to be on “The Yes Album” of which “Your Move” was a popular track. This could be a small reference to that event (but it makes the underlying “Don’t surround yourself” in the lyric more ominous?).
There is also a Carroll reference, but I think it’s limited to the line “Make the white Queen run so fast/she doesn’t have time to make you a wife”. In Through The Looking Glass, Alice meets with the White Queen and the Queen takes Alice for a furious run, afterwards they end up in the exact same square. The Queen explains that it takes her that much effort just to stay in one place.
posted by Leadhyena on 8-10-2007 at 12:57 pm
I once had someone tell me she thought the lyrics in Hendrix’s Purple Haze were, “’scuse me while I kiss this guy” instead of “kiss the sky”.
I didn’t realize this was almost an urban myth. According to the “Archive of Misheard Lyrics” (their actual URL is http://www.kissthisguy.com) it was common and they suggest he actually sang this on occasion.
After all, kiss the sky? Well, yes.. I mean, why be so literal? I always enjoyed Procol Harum, Yes, King Crimson, early Pink Floyd, and ELP for their arcane lyrics. There seemed to be a time in the 60s when we departed from the puritanical oppression of Reason and embraced a more sophisticated, postmodern love of the present. The marriage of surrealistic lyrics with rock and LSD made life interesting. Even without the acid, the beauty was in the text, not meaning, like reading Ulysses or Derrida.
posted by Anad on 8-10-2007 at 1:23 pm
I very recently discovered that the lyrics to Drops of Jupiter by Train include the line:
“And that heaven is overrated”
For the longest time, I thought the words were:
“Van Halen is overrated”
I never understood why Train would say that (although I personally think it’s true), nor could I figure out why it was in the song at all.
Realizing, of course, this is more of a mondegreen situation. On the other hand, the entire song makes no sense to me. Catchy tune, though.
posted by Anita on 8-10-2007 at 2:37 pm
You know chumbawumbas one hit wonder i get knocked down and I get up again etc etc. I need to know what is that girl saying in the background. It sounds like Don’t cry for me extra neighbor. I keep expecting to hear don’t cry for me Argentina but she says something that sounds like extra neighbor. It’s bugged me ever since that song came out.
posted by Shannon on 8-10-2007 at 4:09 pm
nextdoor neighbor
posted by lordstoli on 8-10-2007 at 4:57 pm
I’d say that Oasis’s “Champange Supernova” is up there. The lyrics of “slowly walking down the hall/faster than a cannonball” makes sense, but still doesn’t. It’s still one of my favorite bands however.
posted by Corey on 8-10-2007 at 6:10 pm
Shannon, I think it’s “Don’t cry for me, next door neighbor.” At least, that’s what it sounds like. And Jenni (post #2) is it not “feral like a lioness,” then? That’s how I’ve always heard it, as if the “soiled teenage girlfriend” is an escaped animal…
posted by Danny on 8-10-2007 at 8:53 pm
A little off topic here, but perhaps “Lonely Lab of Broken Hearts” by the Arrogant Worms would be a song the folks here could appreciate.
It takes a special kind of mind to understand them!
posted by Thursday on 8-10-2007 at 10:37 pm
The Squirrel Nut Zippers’ ‘Ghost of Stephen Foster’ is a little odd, but fun.
‘Ships were made for sinking
Whiskey made for drinking
If we were made of celophane,
We’d all get stinking drink much faster!’
It might be a drinking thing, but I’ve never heard it before (big shock, since I’m a minor), it’s just confusing for me, though would be fun to shout it in a crowded bar and see who joins in.
posted by heather on 8-11-2007 at 12:52 am
Then there’s “All Apologies” by Nirvana.
“Find my nest of salt,
everything’s my fault,
I’ll take all the blame,
Aqua seafoam shame.”
posted by Tdave on 8-11-2007 at 2:37 am
I spent much of the seventies being driven crazy by nearly every song Elton John did. He will always be the the king (queen?) of unintelligible lyrics. Of course the lyrics were a Bernie Taupin creation; Elton is just not articulate.
posted by Brad Greenwood on 8-11-2007 at 10:04 am
It took me a loooong time to figure out that Kate Bush was simply speaking French in Peter Gabriel’s “Games Without Frontiers”.
posted by thefirecat on 8-11-2007 at 3:18 pm
“Yellow Ledbetter”
by; Pearl Jam
Can anyone explain even a remote essence of what that poor tormented soul is singing about?
There is a rather ‘beau geste’ video parady that you may want to check out on YouTube called “misheard lyrics” about this one. Search it out!
posted by Susan on 8-11-2007 at 10:10 pm
thefirecat said:
“…. Kate Bush was simply speaking French in Peter Gabriel’s “Games Without Frontiers”.”
So THAT’s what that is!!
posted by Tdave on 8-12-2007 at 4:01 am
Umm, regarding…
“If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now, it’s just a spring clean for the May queen…”
Please see: jeffmilner.com/backmasking.htm
Makes perfect (yet odd) sense backwards.
posted by Zaphod on 8-12-2007 at 5:09 am
My 10th grade english teacher had us analyze the lyrics to Stairway to Heaven as an in class assignment. Many of the words relate to Lord of the Rings. Wish I had my notes. I am sure we talked about those specific lyrics.
posted by Stew on 8-12-2007 at 7:43 am
The May Queen was a term used to refer to Queen Elizabeth the first.
posted by Anne on 8-12-2007 at 8:44 am
Yellow Ledbetter’s lyrics change each performance, but more recent performances hint at the core meaning: lately when performed, the song tells of learning that a loved one has been lost in war. Those left behind simply sit and wonder why and blame themselves.
“and now, he’s coming home in a box or in a bag.”
But I’ve also read where Vedder just goes with whatever lyrics move him.
posted by EddieRocks on 8-12-2007 at 9:39 am
The Smashing Pumpkins’ – “Where Boys Fear to Tread”
Candy cane walks down
To build a bonfire
To break my fall.
…
A go, go, go kids,
A go, go, go stop,
A suck, suck, suck kiss,
A suck, suck, suck style.
posted by P! on 8-12-2007 at 11:08 pm
“One Week” by Barenaked Ladies is mostly stream-of-consciousness lyrics that don’t make a lot of sense. Here’s an example:
Chickety-China,
The Chinese chicken,
You have a drumstick
And your brain stops tickin.
posted by Jeff on 8-13-2007 at 2:25 pm
Like many songwriters, Paul McCartney would often compose a song by writing the melody first, with nonsense lyrics as placeholders. The most famous example of this is Yesterday, which began life as “Scrambled eggs, I really love your legs”.
When Paul was writing “Hey Jude”, he had a placeholder line “The movement you need is on your shoulder”. He was planning to change it, but John Lennon convinced him to keep it, because he liked the sound of it! John liked nonsense lyrics :)
posted by Jeff Coleman on 8-25-2007 at 4:03 pm
But… but… “What if God were one of us” IS perfectly correct grammar. (I’ve run across other posts that touch on this and have managed to refrain from replying, but I can’t stand it anymore.)
This is an example of the subjunctive mood, which expresses something contrary to fact, wished for, imagined, conditional or hypothetical. Past tense verbs in the subjunctive mood are identical to past tense indicative except for the verb “be”.
Subjunctive: “If I were taller, I could reach the top shelf.
Indicative: “He was tall, and he could reach the top shelf.”
Subjunctive mood seems to be disappearing from the vernacular. But I still get a pain in my ear when I hear someone say, “If I was…” instead of “If I were…”
We now return you to your regularly scheduled misheard lyrics discussion. :)
posted by Devon on 10-30-2007 at 10:17 pm
Right on Devon. Now if we could only convince the songwriter!
posted by David on 10-30-2007 at 11:01 pm
The line is “make the white queen run so fast, she hasn’t got time to make you wise”, not “make you a wife” as someone else had suggested. My basic understanding of the chess game analogy in “Alice through the Looking Glass” includes two points that may apply: The chess game is the Red Queen’s game and she suggests that Alice play the White Queen’s pawn. In this sense, the Red Queen may be seen to have made the White Queen run so fast during the game. The White Queen does have the conversation with Alice about running so hard but only remaining in the same place, not being able to advance. At some point in the book, White makes an illegal move by not moving out of check, an unwise move that a child might make, hence the White Queen perhaps runs so fast that she doesn’t even have time to gain the wisdom to avoid the foolish mistake of failing to move out of check. I don’t know if this is what the songwriters actually meant but I do like the analogy of running so hard and fast that you can’t even see what a dumb thing you’re doing and how you’re missing the most obvious and necessary thing you should be doing to move out of harm’s way.
posted by Nyx on 12-11-2007 at 2:46 pm
Macy Gray’s “I Try”
Even though I know the correct lyrics, I hear other ones whenever I listen to the song:
Actual Lyrics:
“My world crumbles when you are not near.”
Heard lyrics:
“I wear goggles when you are not here.”
posted by Kirsten on 1-3-2008 at 12:40 pm