I didnt know it mean that

One of my favorites is "Possum Kingdom" by the Toadies. Most folks take it as something about sexual assault, but it's more of a horror story.

"I would go to Possum Kingdom Lake where my family has some land and it was just really cool and creepy and just a really interesting place. Names like Hell's Gate and Devil's Island and all this weird nomenclature that just kind of lends itself to that kind of storytelling. I was reading a lot of Stephen King and similar type horror fiction and every dark thing that I could read, so that song is about a character that's kind of stuck in another world, out floating around Possum Kingdom Lake. He's lonely and freaked out and just wanting to lure somebody else into his little realm. This guy wants to convince somebody else to do what he did, which is to burn themselves alive in order to be this other thing."

Other interpretations are that it's about a vampire, or the devil himself.

In the 1980's, there was a popular rock song, Forget Me Not by Bad English. Being a somewhat oblivious kid (and the lyrics being a bit hard to pick out on the radio, and not having seen the video), I didn't realize the lyrics were about a vampire/reincarnation until a DJ mentioned it - round about the time they stopped playing it.

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Ring around a rosy
Pockets full of posies
Ashes, Ashes
We all fall down.

References the Black Death. People kept flowers around them to avoid the smell.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

I found out recently that the 1980s power ballad "China in your Hand" is actually about Frankenstein.

It blew my mind when the singer of Semisonic said the song "Closing Time" is not about that eye-blinking, awkward period when the bars turn on the lights and kick you out for the night -- it's about being born.

Not all the lyrics fit that interpretation, but most of them do and are more powerful for it.

Siri Kirpal said:

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Ring around a rosy
Pockets full of posies
Ashes, Ashes
We all fall down.

References the Black Death. People kept flowers around them to avoid the smell.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

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Interestingly, the British version is different.

Ring a-ring of rosies
A pocket full of posies
Atishoo! Atishoo!
We all fall down.

There must be a range of regional variations.

Helix said:

Interestingly, the British version is different.

Ring a-ring of rosies
A pocket full of posies
Atishoo! Atishoo!
We all fall down.

There must be a range of regional variations.

Click to expand...

Or things drift due to misunderstanding of lyrics.

When I was a kid (means pre-adolescent child here, not baby goat), we used to yell a thing when charging at something. The actual text was "Charge to the letter K". It wasn't until I was an adult that I realized the proper quote was "Charge of the Light Brigade."

Years ago I taught in a rural high school with an ultra religious music teacher--a grad of Oral Roberts U. Somehow she was exposed to a rock n Roll station (Satan probably nudged the dial.) and heard a wonderful spiritual about a man who gets knocked down but always gets up again. The chorus was especially moving--something about praying the Night away. So she ordered the cassette tape--This was waaaay back in the Pleistocene-- and then she played it for her first hour class. Naturally she was horrified to see that the song was titled tubThumping but figured it must be some British slang for Redemption. The kids had no problem singing the chorus. When she realized her error she took the tape out of the machine and tried to throw it in the trash can. The kids persuaded her not to throw a brand new tape out because they said Mrs. Smith--the depraved English teacher down the hall-- loved that song. So I found the tape in my school mailbox with a curt little note saying that she had bought it in error and that she had heard that I might enjoy it. I did. --s6

Siri Kirpal said:

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Ring around a rosy
Pockets full of posies
Ashes, Ashes
We all fall down.

References the Black Death. People kept flowers around them to avoid the smell.

Click to expand...

This is a myth. Really. First of all, even the very earliest attested version is in Modern English. Not Middle English.

There is no Middle English variant.

There's no substantiating evidence that people kept flowers around because of the odor.

Frankly, with open sewers etc, and piles of corpses waiting for burial, no one had energy or time to pick or grow flowers.

Most of the plague outbreaks were in Winter and Spring; not a lot of flowers to be had.

Don't take my word for it; here's Snopes.

Sat Nam! (Literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Okay, good to know.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

Siri Kirpal said:

Sat Nam! (Literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Okay, good to know.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

Click to expand...

I think most people don't realize that it's not about the plague; I've seen that asserted in all sorts of places, but you'll notice, they never provide a primary source.

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Kinda like Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds NOT being about LSD.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

Siri Kirpal said:

Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Kinda like Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds NOT being about LSD.

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal

Click to expand...

There's a difference though. That interpretation of 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' was contemporaneous with the song's creation, not (supposedly) hundreds of years after.

A work acquaintance from years ago bragged that she was going to have The Police's "Every Breath You Take" as the first dance at her wedding.

I said "You sure you want that song? I do not think it means what you think it means..."

Tons of people used Every Breath You Take as wedding songs, clearly a misunderstanding waiting to happen.

Myrealana said:

A work acquaintance from years ago bragged that she was going to have The Police's "Every Breath You Take" as the first dance at her wedding.

I said "You sure you want that song? I do not think it means what you think it means..."

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I once met a guy in the UK (a friend-of-a-friend kind of deal) who did wedding videography as a side-gig. He proudly showed me one of his wedding videos. He'd set the intro--of the bride and groom getting ready for the day ahead--to soft instrumental music...

...of Roxette's "It Must Have Been Love (But It's Over Now)."

He asked why I was laughing. He did not know what the song was, he just thought the music was "really lovely." He had also used that background music in just about every wedding video he had ever made.

Oops.

Ouch! Not that I believe in omens, but...just saying.

Scarborough Fair:

Lovely melody, old-timey lyrics, even references to cooking herbs, "something...something...true love of mine." Surely it's a sweet love song, right?

Nope. With lyrics like these -

Tell her to make me a cambric shirt,
Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,
Without any seam or needlework,
Then she'll be a true love of mine.

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It's basically a guy saying, "Oh, you're visiting that area? Say "Hi" to my ex. Also, tell her I'll take her back when Hell freezes over (after she accomplishes various impossible tasks).

Tazlima said:

Scarborough Fair:

Lovely melody, old-timey lyrics, references to freakin' cooking herbs, surely it's a sweet love song, right?

Nope. With lyrics like these -



It's basically a guy saying, "Oh, you're visiting that area? Say "Hi" to my ex. Also, tell her I'll take her back when Hell freezes over (after she accomplishes various impossible tasks).

Click to expand...

My favorite story with this one was (I think) in one of those magazines they have in the doctor's office where people send in anecdotes.

This guy was listening to the oldies station, and Scarborough Faire came on. When the song ended, his kidlet was very confused and demanded to know if "he did it."

The confused kid had misheard the chorus and wanted Dad to explain "Did Parsley save Rosemary in time???"

creativemechanic said:

Nursery rhyme
It's raining it's pouring, the old man is
He went to bed and bumped his head and didn't get up in the morning(he died in his sleep)

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Not sure I agree with this one. It says "the old man IS snoring." The present tense implies he's still alive... can't snore if you're dead. Still, he's got to at least have a concussion; most bumps on the head won't lay you out like that.

Tazlima said:

Scarborough Fair:

Lovely melody, old-timey lyrics, even references to cooking herbs, "something...something...true love of mine." Surely it's a sweet love song, right?

Nope. With lyrics like these -



It's basically a guy saying, "Oh, you're visiting that area? Say "Hi" to my ex. Also, tell her I'll take her back when Hell freezes over (after she accomplishes various impossible tasks).

Click to expand...

It's an example of a ballad type called a riddling ballad; the most popular versions, and the one used by Simon and Garfunkle, are derived from 19th century broad side ballads. It's closely related, and possibly partially derived from Child Ballad 1 "Riddles Widely Expounded," and Child Ballad 2 "The Elfin Knight."

Some of the versions may have references to an anti conception remedy (hence the refrain: Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme).

Earlier versions, like most riddling ballads, had a set of verses by a man asking for impossible tasks, with a set of responses from a woman.

"Scarborough fair" was a genuine traditional fair, known especially for horse trading, in Yorkshire.

One of my long-term projects has been to put up some pages about the ballads; I better get on that . . .

It occurs to me that there's an interesting word in this context:

mondegreen

n.
A series of words that result from the mishearing or misinterpretation of a statement or song lyric. For example, I led the pigeons to the flag for I pledge allegiance to the flag.

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Little kids are really really amazing about creating/discovering mondegreens.

AW Admin said:

It occurs to me that there's an interesting word in this context:

mondegreen



Little kids are really really amazing about creating/discovering mondegreens.

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As a said little kid, my husband thought that "Takin' Care of Business" was advertising "Bacon carrot biscuits." Someday, I'm going to make those.

"One Night in Bangkok" is one of those songs that most people only hear a few certain phrases of and think it's about something completely different than it really is. (Chess. It's about chess. Blew my mind when I realized.)

AW Admin said:

"Scarborough fair" was a genuine traditional fair, known especially for horse trading, in Yorkshire.

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It's also a long-running ren-fest in Waxahachie Texas.