San Diego Reader

Far from fab merchandise

Contents:

Weird Beatles Memorabilia

More Misheard Lyrics

Worst Presnadent Ever

Famous Former Neighbors: The Article - Local Celeb Gravesites

My Brunch With Yoko: Brunch With a Beatle Bride

Yoko Ono Comics and Stories: When John Lennon Met Yoko

Snotley Crue: Motley comic spoof

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WEIRD BEATLES MEMORABILIA

     

 (No, not cocaine – it’s Lux Soap!)  

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MISHEARD LYRICS

For anyone who ever sang “and there’s a wino down the road” during “Stairway To Heaven,” www.kissthisguy.com invites posts from those who’ve long mistaken or misheard song lyrics. Entries feature the actual lyric followed by listeners’ erroneous interpretations, with some contributors describing when and where they first found out the real words. Searchable by song title or artist, several artists with local ties evidently need diction lessons.

Blink 182 – real lyric from The Rock Show:

“I fell in love with the girl at the rock show/She said ‘What’ and I told her that I didn't know.”

Misheard as “I went down on the girl at the rock show/She said ‘What’ and I told her Garfield was a show.”

Also, blink’s title lyric to What’s My Age Again was misheard as “Where’s my Asian friend?”

  Gary Puckett & The Union Gap – real lyric from Woman, Woman: “Have you got cheating on your mind?”

Misheard as “Have you got cheese on your mouth?”

Iron Butterfly’s title lyric from 1968’s In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida was variously misheard as “In a garage in Toledo,” “In the garden I pe-d in” and “I'm the god of Velveeta.”

Tijuana native Carlos Santana was mistranslated, with his title lyric from Oye Como Va misheard as commercial pitches for imaginary products called “Jimmy Cocoa Pops” and “Oil-Up Cocoa Butter.”

Tom Waits wrote Innocent When You Dream with the bittersweet line “I gave my love a locket and then I broke her heart,” misheard in a much darker context as “I gave my love a lockjaw and then I broke her arm.”

Stone Temple Pilots – real lyric from Big Bang Baby: “We used to see in color, now it's only black & white.”

Misheard as “You should see them coming, Hall & Oates in black & white.”

Real lyric from STP’s Big Empty: “Her dizzy head is conscience-laden.”

Misheard as “Her lazy head is constipated.”

Real lyric from STP’s Plush: “And I feel that time’s a wasted go.”

Misheard as “And I'm feeling like a ham and mustard shake.”

Jewel would seem to have the worst pronunciation skills of all local artists (insert your own dental joke here), with over a dozen misheard lyrics from several different songs quoted.

Real lyric from Foolish Games: “I got my eggs, I got my pancakes too.”

Misheard as “I got my AIDS, I got my backaches too.”

Real lyric from You Were Meant For Me: "I kinda like it in my brand new place."

Misheard as "I found a maggot in my bran-oat flakes."

Real lyric from Deep Water: “And when you're drowning in deep water, and you wake up making love to a wall.”

Misheard as “And when you're drowning in deep water, and you wake up making love to a whale.”

Jewel’s line in “The Morning Song” which says “We'll sit on the front porch, the sun can warm my feet” was misheard as “You’ll sit on the front porch sucking on my feet.”

From the same song, “Don’t worry about what your sister said” was misheard as “Don’t wonder about that ol’ Sister Sledge.”

Finally, Jewel’s title lyric to Who Will Save Your Soul? was misheard by one whimsical (or deeply disturbed) listener as “Who will shave your mole?”

Performers with local ties also have Misheard Lyrics listed at www.amiright.com:>

Pearl Jam is at #3 on a list of “Most Difficult To Understand” bands. One time OB surfer Eddie Vedder sang “Whoa, I’m still alive” but was misheard pitching “Whoa I love Amstel light” and whining “Woe I’m sterilized.”

A line from later in the song, “And if so, if so, who answers, who answers?,” was misheard as “And I smoke, smoke, Winstons, Winstons.”

From PJ’s “Animal,” the line “I’d rather be with an animal” was misheard as “I’d rather speed with an enema” and “I’d rather pee in a urinal.”

From PJ’s “Satan’s Bed,” the line “Jump off a cliff, don't need your help, so back off” was misheard as “John Bobbitt, please don't leave your nuts on my car.”

Eddie Vedder sang Glorified Version of a Pellet Gun, misheard as “Low-flying version of a pelican.”

Finally, from “Better Man,” the line “Can’t find a better man” was, despite the song title, variously misheard as “Can't find my bed again,” “Campfire or a Batman,” “Can't find the butter man,” “Can't find a beer again,” “Can't find a buttered ham.”

More misheard lyrics of performers with local ties can be found at ivillage.co.uk:

POD’s title lyric to “I And Identify” was misheard as “I am a dental file.”

From their song “Sleeping Awake” (on the Matrix Reloaded soundtrack), the line “explain these motions and metaphors, unlock these secrets in me” was misheard as “In pain this moping and metal force, unlock these sequestered inmates.”

P.O.D.’s real lyric from Youth Of The Nation “told the world how he felt, with the sound of a gat” makes a gun reference (gat), mistaken as a unique suicide weapon when misheard as “Took his own life with the side of a cat.” The title lyric itself was misheard as “use your imagination.”

From Switchfoot’s “Meant To Live,” the line “Dreaming about Providence and whether mice or men have second tries” was misheard as “Dream about pounding dents and whether nicer men have sucky tires.”

Jason Mraz, in “On Love, In Sadness,” sang “And we just lay awake in lust and rust in the rain,” but this was misheard as “And we just layaway in Los Angeles a rusted ring.”

Additional local-centric Misheard Lyrics can be found at www.iusedtobelieve.com:>

Bauhaus, with local scenester David J, were singing “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” misheard as “Bella The Goose is dead.”

The Beach Boys, who once owned a Mission Beach nightclub, sang in Kokomo of “that Monserrat mystique,” misheard as “that man’s a rotten stinker.

Local casino shill Kenny Rogers sang of Lucille leaving him with “four hungry kids and a crop in the field,” misheard alternately as “four hundred kids had a crap in the field” and “four horny kids and a box of oatmeal.”

Part-time Encinitas resident, the late George Harrison, had his title lyric to Got My Mind Set On You misheard as “Oh God, my mom sat on you.”

North County’s David Gates wrote one of Bread’s biggest hits, Make It With You, misheard as “naked with you.”

In “Hello I Love You,” onetime Clairemont Boy Scout Jim Morrison sang “Do you hope to pluck this dusky jewel?” --- misheard as “Do you hope to f-ck this dusty Jew?”

Blink 182 seemed strangely enthusiastic about Judaism in “What’s My Age Again?” when “Why would you wish down on me?” was misheard as “While a Jew was down on me.”

Jason Mraz’ “The Remedy” confused several medically uninformed listeners, when the line “is sure to outlast his catastrophe” was misheard as “a sugar high blast of colostomy.”

In the same song, “We will cure this dirty old disease” was misheard as “She has the dirty hoe disease.”

Jim Croce played Lothario in the title lyric to “Time In a Bottle,” only to be misheard as the far less romantic “Mime in a brothel.”

In Croce’s “Operator,” the observation “Guy she said she knew well and sometimes hated” was misheard as the decidedly more troubling “Guy's just such a nude that sometimes I hate him.”

From Ratt’s “Round And Round,” the line “Tightening our belts, abused ourselves” was misheard as “Titanium bells appease the Celts” and “Taco Bells and pizza sells.”

Finally, POD’s attempt at a shout out for their old San Diego ‘hood in “Boom,” singing “I never knew that a kid like me could take his mic around the world and flash the big S.D” was misheard as the less local-centric “could take his bike around the world and flash a big ass Dee.”

One listener spent years thinking the Cal Worthington Ford TV commercial theme “Go See Cal” was actually a song about a “Pussy Cow.”

And that, boys and girls, is why Mission Beach High’s own Frank Zappa invented the lyric sheet in 1964 (debuting the following year in his Freak Out LP). **************************************

WORST PRESNADENT EVER

Local singer/songwriter Charlie Imes’ new album includes the song “Worst Presnadent Ever,” featuring the George W. Bush impersonator from Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. “James Adomian is also the guy always playing Bush on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson,” says Imes, who describes how the impressionist came to be on his album. “I produced DemocracyFest at SDSU’s Open Air Theater awhile back, which included Cindy Lee Berryhill, Berkley Hart, Laurence Juber, and comedians like Al Franken and Marc Maron entertaining between speeches by politicos like Howard Dean and Maxine Waters. A year later, when I was recording ‘Worst Presnadent Ever,’ I contacted a couple of well-known Bush impersonators, only to discover they wouldn’t do this type of song, knocking Bush. I even bugged my connections at liberal talk radio stations, to no avail.” It was DemocracyFest comedian Marc Maron who finally put Imes in touch with a Bush impersonator willing to spite the hand that feeds him. “So James Adomian was great, but now that I want to shoot a video of the song, he’s a lot harder to track down and schedule.” On An Island features other locals like Chris Klich, Jeff Berkley (Berkley Hart), Brian “Nucci” Cantrell (Lady Dottie and the Diamonds), Bill Coomes (Citizen Band), Barbara Nesbitt, Cathryn Beeks, Cindy Lee Berryhill, and jazz trumpeter Gilbert Castellanos. Paul McCartney and Wings guitarist Laurence Juber co-wrote and plays on the song “Morning Birds.” “As luck would have it,” reports Imes, “we did manage to get James Adomian to come down to San Diego and reprise his role as President Bush for the video. Filming went well and was knocked out in two days. By sheer coincidence, James was only available to come down and film his Bush parts on one day: Sept. 11th. Spooky.” Several local musicians make appearances in the video. Singer/songwriter John Katchur plays a street musician playing guitar in the park. Delene St. Clair & Barry Cahill (Hot Pursuit Band, Cahill & Delene) and Marcia Claire (bass player for Citizen Band, Barbara Nesbitt, Cindy Lee Berryhill) play members of the White House Press Corps. Barry Cahill appears as Richard Nixon. Drummer Billy Wear (Bob Karwin Band, Falcon Mohawk, Scott Wilson) who teaches drums at Music Central in Clairemont, portrayed Karl Rove for the video. Multi jazz instrumentalist and San Diego Music Award Nominee Chris Klich appears as a science teacher and his wife, singer Laura Preble plays a religous teacher who clobbers him with a bible in the video. J.G. Franklin (Gunner Jump) plays a seargent working in the NSA Operations Center.

Drummer and vocalist Bill Coomes (Deadline Friday, Citizen Band) makes a vocal cameo, as a Scottish chipmunk singing on American Idol. According to Imes, “He’s singing Do Ya Think I'm Sexy as a chipmunk, in the scene where Bush has me captured, cuffed, and gagged.” “Worst Presnadent Ever” appears on Imes’ new album On An Island, which is also the name of a recent high profile CD and DVD by Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour. “On An Island seemed to work better than The Wall Around An Island or Dark Side Of An Island,” jokes Imes. “Seriously, Gilmour’s album never entered into my thinking. My sound is more Jimmy Buffett than Pink Floyd, so it never really occurred to me there would be any association or downside. Besides, people who Google for me tend to use my name, rather than the CD title. At least I think they do.”

The video can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v00IFnQBNf8 and also at http://www.worstprez.com

 

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"Famous Former Neighbors - The Article: Underground With The Celebrity Dead" - Local gravesites of the rich and famous.

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/weblogs/bands/2008/sep/27/famous-former-neighbors-the-article-plus-misheard-/

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My Brunch With Yoko - Brunch with a Beatle bride.

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/weblogs/bands/2008/sep/27/famous-former-neighbors-the-article-plus-misheard-/

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Yoko Ono Comics and Stories - When Johnny Met Yoko, with dialogue and captions paraphrased from published Lennon interviews.

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/weblogs/bands/2008/sep/27/famous-former-neighbors-the-article-plus-misheard-/

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Snotley Crue Comics and Stories - spoofing U-know-hooey --------

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/weblogs/bands/2008/sep/27/famous-former-neighbors-the-article-plus-misheard-/

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Like this blog? Here are some related links:

OVERHEARD IN SAN DIEGO - Several years' worth of this comic strip, which debuted in the Reader in 1996: http://www.sandiegoreader.com/photos/galleries/overheard-san-diego/

FAMOUS FORMER NEIGHBORS - Over 100 comic strips online, with mini-bios of famous San Diegans: http://www.sandiegoreader.com/photos/galleries/famous-former-neighbors/

SAN DIEGO READER MUSIC MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/sandiegoreadermusic

JAY ALLEN SANFORD MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/jayallensanford