Dipping into the Blogpond

When my son was little, he was into music, as many kids are – at nearly 16 he still is today, just that it’s his “own” music.

It’s funny to hear kids make up their own lyrics to songs – almost as funny as when adults do it. When he first started school he told me they’d sung a song about “Australian pairs” – he was adamant “not the fruit, but two of a kind”. I finally realised he was talking about “Advance Australia Fair”! I also remember when he first heard Tina Arena’s song “I’m in Chains” and he used to sing (loudly) “I’m insaaaaane”.

So too little Nikki (our 3 year old) loves the song “You are my sunshine” (actually if you have 41 seconds to kill you can listen to it here). The lyric “so I hung my head and cried” didn’t make sense to her, so she ad libbed “so I bumped my head and cried”. The funny variation of the two is in the audio….

And did I mention adults do this too? I remember the first time I heard Savage Garden’s “Animal Song”, I swear I thought the lyrics were “I want to live like cannibals”, then I thought that it didn’t make sense – maybe it was “I want to live like cannonballs”, nope that makes even less sense.

Well, now you can find out – AND realise you’re not the only one. There’s a site called “Am I right” which lists not only misheard lyrics, but also parodies of songs. I was introduced to this site by Taking a Sanity Break.

You can have a lot of fun, there’s thousands of songs listed. An example of a parody of “50 Ways to Leave your Lover” (Paul Simon), and one which Aussies (especially Queenslanders) can relate to:

50 Ways to kill a cane toad

The problem is all inside your head
She said to me
The answer is easy if you
Take it logically
I’d like to help you in your struggle
To be free
There must be fifty ways
To kill a cane toad

She said it’s really not my habit
To intrude
Furthermore, I hope my meaning
Won’t be lost or misconstrued
But I’ll repeat myself
At the risk of being crude
There must be fifty ways
To kill a cane toad
Fifty ways to kill a cane toad

CHORUS:
Just jump on its back, Jack
Fry it in the pan, Stan
You don’t need to be coy, Roy
Just get yourself free
Run over it with a bus, Gus
You don’t need to discuss much
Just put it in the fridge, Midge
And get yourself free

Club this frog to death, Jeff,
impale it on a spike, Mike
shoot it in the head, Fred,
stuff it with a firecracker
And blow it to smithereens

She said it grieves me so
To see you in such pain
I wish there was something I could do
To make this frog smile again
I said I appreciate that
And would you please explain
About the fifty ways
She said why don’t we both
Just sleep on it tonight
And I believe in the morning
You’ll begin to see the light
And then she kissed me
And I realized she probably was right
There must be fifty ways
To kill a cane toad

Fifty ways to kill a cane toad

CHORUS

Know the Cher song “Walking in Memphis”? Then complete this lyric (and Google searching is NOT allowed!)

“Then I’m walking in Memphis,
walking with……”

See, maybe you can learn something from AmIRight? If you are, or were, into music you can have A LOT of fun with this site.