Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Mispronunciations in Songs

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Mispronunciations in Songs

    "These Things Take Time" by The Smiths pronounces this word as "wonder kind"

    https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/...ish/wunderkind

    Still a fabulous song, though, which was probably knocked off in an hour or so in a BBC studio

    Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 27-10-2017, 22:47.

    #2
    Anarch-EYE-st is the obvious one.

    Whatever Kurt Cobain mumbles instead of "At all the millions here" in The Man Who Sold The World.

    Brett Anderson's pronunciation of the J in "marijuana".

    Comment


      #3
      Originally posted by 3 Colours Red View Post
      Whatever Kurt Cobain mumbles instead of "At all the millions here" in The Man Who Sold The World.
      Something very strange about 'mult-i millionaires', if I recall correctly. (Morrissey also chucks an extraneous consonant into 'criminally' in How Soon is Now?)

      In Megadeth's rather-odd cover of Anarchy in the UK, Dave Mustaine sings about a 'c***-like tendency' - presumably because he had no idea what a 'council tenancy' was.

      The most egregious of which I can think offhand is Jaz Mann's cringeworthy utterance about a 'Try-annosaurus' at the beginning of Animal Army - the abysmal follow-up to Babylon Zoo's Spaceman.

      Comment


        #4
        Originally posted by 3 Colours Red View Post

        Brett Anderson's pronunciation of the J in "marijuana".
        See* also Shaun Ryder's in Country Song.

        *Hear

        Comment


          #5
          'Febuary' in American Pie and Somebody Told Me.

          Comment


            #6
            Steve Jones, "Circumstised the skipper".

            Comment


              #7
              In 1980's chart-bothering Babooshka, Kate Bush sings 'she couldn't have made a worst move', when the correct term is clearly 'worse', ie, a comparative.

              This has always bugged me.

              Comment


                #8
                "He made his home in, that fishes ab-do-men" from it Ain't Necessarily So by Bronski Beat really jars with me

                Comment


                  #9
                  If we're counting presumably deliberate mispronunciations (i.e words tortured to fit the scansion), since I'm fairly sure Stevie Nicks must know how to actually say 'washes', then: "When the rain wa-SHES you clean, you know" – Fleetwood Mac, Dreams. Also faithfully reproduced by the Corrs a couple of decades later.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    In Blue Sky Mine by Midnight Oil, Peter Garrett sings 'Who's going to shave me?' instead of 'save me'. He manages to pronounce it right when he sings it live.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Alice has been there, she said it was fun
                      Swimming and surfing, enjoying the sun
                      Hey Honololu, we're going to happy Ha-wye

                      (ABBA)

                      Comment


                        #12
                        There's a song from the last 10 years that makes a big deal of the word "mischievous."
                        Only the singer sings "miss-chee-vee-ous" which annoyed the fuck out of me then and now.

                        Google-fu isn't turning anything up (it wasn't Emma Bunton. It was a black female singer. I seem to remember she was sat in a car for some of the video.)

                        Comment


                          #13
                          This is the second time I have encountered "Google-fu" today (and also the second time in my entire life). What does it mean?

                          Comment


                            #14
                            I can't speak Spanish. When Wall Of Voodoo sing about wishing they were in Tee-hoo-ana, eating barbecued iguana, is that a mispronunciation or not?

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by ad hoc View Post
                              This is the second time I have encountered "Google-fu" today (and also the second time in my entire life). What does it mean?
                              Just the art/skill of using Google.

                              Comment


                                #16
                                Oh. So the fu is not some initials, and not pronounced fuh, but rather it's like kung-fu?

                                Comment


                                  #17
                                  Yes. Google-fu is another term for search-engine ninjitsu.
                                  You're just not a down-with-the-kids hep cat like what I am, daddio. I bet you don't even know who's swinging at the top of the hit parade.

                                  Comment


                                    #18
                                    Yes, I don't have my finger on the nub of youth

                                    Comment


                                      #19
                                      On my vinyl copy of Heroes, Bowie starts singing in French halfway through, with some pronunciation that even I find suspect.

                                      Comment


                                        #20
                                        I remember reading that Joe Strummer's Spanish in "Spanish Bombs" is very dodgy (possibly the result of mispronouncing some South American dialect).

                                        Slightly different (and debatable as to whether is a mispronunciation) is the almost ubiquitous use of "axe" instead of "ask" in much hip-hop...

                                        Comment


                                          #21
                                          Originally posted by Kevin S View Post
                                          Alice has been there, she said it was fun
                                          Swimming and surfing, enjoying the sun
                                          Hey Honololu, we're going to happy Ha-wye

                                          (ABBA)
                                          The correct pronunciation of Hawaii is a whole new can of worms. The glottal stop between the two "i"s and do you pronounce the "w" as a "v"?

                                          Comment


                                            #22
                                            Originally posted by treibeis View Post
                                            I can't speak Spanish. When Wall Of Voodoo sing about wishing they were in Tee-hoo-ana, eating barbecued iguana, is that a mispronunciation or not?
                                            Aargh, this has inexorably reminded me of the Vengaboys' execrable (even by their standards) We're Going To Ibiza – or, as it was sung: "Whoa! We're going to Ee-beetz-ah".

                                            Comment


                                              #23
                                              Originally posted by hobbes View Post
                                              There's a song from the last 10 years that makes a big deal of the word "mischievous."
                                              Only the singer sings "miss-chee-vee-ous" which annoyed the fuck out of me then and now.

                                              Google-fu isn't turning anything up (it wasn't Emma Bunton. It was a black female singer. I seem to remember she was sat in a car for some of the video.)
                                              Never Forget You, by the Noisettes?

                                              I think there's an instance in Ebeneezer Goode too, to rhyme with devious.

                                              Comment


                                                #24
                                                I've never heard anyone IRL pronounce 'mountain' as anything but moun-tin or mount'n. Certainly not moun-tain like uh...plantain or uh...that's probably about it. But Duran Duran pronounce it as such in Rio ("from moun-tains in the north down to...") and that Gonna Build A Mountain song from Anthony Newly.

                                                Comment


                                                  #25
                                                  Never Forget You, by the Noisettes?
                                                  We have a winner!

                                                  Comment

                                                  Working...
                                                  X