Mondegreen - Examples - in Songs

In Songs

The top three mondegreens submitted regularly to mondegreen expert Jon Carroll are:

1. "Gladly, the cross-eyed bear (from the line in the hymn "Keep Thou My Way" by Fanny Crosby and Theodore E. Perkins, "Kept by Thy tender care, gladly the cross I'll bear") Carroll and many others quote it as "Gladly the cross I'd bear".
2. There's a bathroom on the right (the line at the end of each verse of "Bad Moon Rising" by Creedence Clearwater Revival: "There's a bad moon on the rise")
3. 'Scuse me while I kiss this guy (from a lyric in the song "Purple Haze", by Jimi Hendrix: "'Scuse me while I kiss the sky").

Both Creedence's John Fogerty and Hendrix eventually acknowledged these mishearings by deliberately singing the "mondegreen" versions of their songs in concert.

Rap and hip hop lyrics may be particularly susceptible to being misheard because they are often improvised and frequently lack an official, written version. This issue gained publicity in 2010 over multiple errors claimed in lyrics printed in the Anthology of Rap, printed by Yale University Press.

"Blinded by the Light," a cover of a Bruce Springsteen song by the Manfred Mann's Earth Band, contains what has been called "probably the most misheard lyric of all time". The phrase "revved up like a deuce" (altered from Springsteen's original "cut loose like a deuce") is frequently misheard as "wrapped up like a douche". The comedy show The Vacant Lot built an entire skit, called "Blinded by the Light", around four friends arguing about the lyrics.

In the lyrics to the opening theme to the FOX animated television series Family Guy, after the cast sings "Lucky there's a man who, positively can do, all the things to make us..." it was widely thought that Stewie Griffin sang "effin' cry" (or "f'in cry"). However, in an interview, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane stated that Stewie actually sings "laugh and cry." The theme to later seasons (starting with "The Kiss Seen Around the World"). was re-recorded and the actual line is heard more clearly. The mondegreen was referenced by Peter Griffin in the episode "Friends of Peter G." when he utters to Stewie in a drunken slur, "laugh and cry, effin' cry, what's the difference?".

A number of misheard lyrics have been recorded, turning a mondegreen into a real title. They include:

• The song "Sea Lion Woman", recorded in 1939 by Christine and Katherine Shipp, was performed by Nina Simone under the title "See Line Woman" and later by Feist as "Sealion". According to the liner notes from the compilation "A Treasury of Library of Congress Field Recordings," the actual title of this playground song might also be "See Lyin' Woman" or "C-Line Woman."
• Jack Lawrence's misinterpretation of the French phrase "pauvre Jean" ("poor John") as the identically pronounced "pauvres gens" ("poor people") led to the translation of La goualante du pauvre Jean ("The Ballad of Poor John") as The Poor People of Paris, which in no way hindered it from becoming a major hit in 1956.