Lady Mondegreen

We were singing along to the radio in the car this morning when my daughter asked why Whitney Houston was ‘bending over’ in the song. It turns out that the song “I’m Every Woman” does indeed sound like Whitney is belting out “I’m bending over.” Given that the next line is “Its all in me” I may have to suggest that she sings the correct words, in order to avoid the rather pornographic imagery.
I am enjoying a leftover glass of lemony Gavi La Madonnina Araldica (£6.99 Ocado) and slowly realising that my daughter has inherited the family ‘mondegreen’ gene – the ability to mishear or reinterpret lyrics at will. I blame my own father, who wilfully sings the wrong lyrics to almost every song he knows. To this day, if I ever hear the opening line of the hymn “Holy holy holy” I want to add “Two full backs and a goalie.”
H is just as bad. Last year he bought me a Bee Gees compilation CD (don’t mock) called “Number Ones” (which does beg the question as to whether there will be a follow up CD called “Number Twos” – maybe not). I was singing away to “How Deep Is Your Love” and got to the line “When they all should let us be” when he stopped me and asked me to sing that bit again. He finally fessed up that he had always thought that line was “When they all showed letters B” – imagining holding up giant letter Bs in the manner of a presenter of pre-school TV. He still hasn’t recovered from the embarrassment.
When I was at school, you had to buy Smash Hits if you wanted to find out song lyrics. Now there is a whole rash of websites dedicated to them, so there is really no excuse any more for singing the wrong words – thus depriving a whole generation of school kids hours of sniggering fun. I recall giggling with my schoolmates at the Boney M song “Brown Girl in the Ring” and the line “Show me your motion” which we thought we had misheard – the original presumably being “Show me emotion”. Trawling the lyrics websites today I am astounded to realise that the correct words are in fact “Show me your motion.”
Boney M, what were you thinking?