'Scuse me while I kiss this guy

My sister, a lovely girl though not really much of a music fan, is queen of misheard lyrics. As a child, she thought “Werewolves of London” was “Werewolves of Thunder.” Actually, as I write this that is unfortunately the only example I can think of and it’s not even that good. There were numerous other faux pas (what is the plural of faux pas?), though for some reason I can only think of her non-lyrics related ones, like when she confused John Lennon and Elton John or when she suggested that we buy a PINT (pronounced to rhyme with mint!) of ice cream.
Anyway, some of my favorite misheard lyrics stories include Beth’s thinking that “Our Lips Are Sealed” was “Arlis the Seal.” (Dude, I dare you to not hear “Arlis the Seal” from now on! The song is totally ruined for me!) and Jessica (who has maybe my favorite misheard lyric story of all time!) who thought the lyrics to “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson were: “Billie Jean is huh huh huh huh. She’s just a girl who thinks that I am the one. The chicken is not my mom.”
The point of mentioning it (aside from the fact that now all of you will instinctually hear “Arlis the Seal” whenever that GoGo’s song plays) is that my sister, knowing full well how ditzy she is when it comes to song lyrics and how funny I think it is, sent me a link to this site www.kissthisguy.com . It is obviously named for the most popular misheard lyric of all time from “Purple Haze.” It is pretty funny. I especially love that everyone on the site was clearly as confused as I was regarding Elton John’s “Rocket Man” and the lyric, “burning up his fuse out here alone.” Especially the person who wrote in thinking that he was saying either “burning up like cheese and pheromone” or “burning up like Jesus’ hairy bone.”
I totally had a misheard lyrics moment this morning on my way to work. I was listening to the Notwist album “Shrink” as I walked to the Subway and, since I had forgotten to bring a book with me to read on the train I found myself heavily concentrating on the song’s lyrics. (Which are, as follows:
The shore
I can see the shore from here
I see your town, your house
and you
The score is
I count the letters of your name
I count the days 'til you
are here again
Day 7
And I'm love galore)

I should add that they are a band of few words. This is actually quite a long song. I kept hearing “Day 7, and I love the Lord,” which was a major turnoff because a) I am admittedly prejudiced against religious people and b) I don’t like any religious imagery in my popular music. However, I was kind of interested by their turn of phrase since I ALWAYS say things like “he loves the lord” to connote someone I think is crazy religious. It made sense to me at the time—I mean according to Bible thumpers it took God 7 days to make the earth so it would make sense for a song called “Day 7” to have some God talk in it. By the time I’d gotten into the office I was full on bothered by this lyric so I looked it up online and was so pleased to see that I’d been wrong. (Although is it terrible if I admit that I think that “I’m in love galore” is a totally stupid lyric? Whatever. I still love the band. Plus their foreign and English isn’t their first language so it’s easy to forgive them!)

Speaking of people who love the lord….(how’s that for a segue?—speaking of segue, that was another one of my sister’s language faux pas. She always pronounced it “se-goo.”) I’d like to take this opportunity to bring this blog back to basics. When I started this fucker almost a year ago I was interested in only a few key things: what albums were going to make everyone’s “Best of” lists, talking about OutKast and Ryan Adams, AND hating Mel Gibson. After “The Passion” broke a million box office records by enticing all of the brainwashed religious freak masses to leave their houses where they homeschool their children (in preparation for the upcoming election, natch!) I sort of lost interest in hating on him. I mean there were so many other, better equipped, more eloquent people who were able to come out and talk about what a nut he is (like the dudes on South Park! Or even Gibson himself—he came off crazier than I thought he was when he let Diane Sawyer interview him!) but now that he has thrust his totally uninvited and uninformed nose back into public debate I feel it is my duty to call him names again on my blog.
For those of you not in the know, Gibson has been speaking out against stem cell research and the recently passed California initiative Proposition 71. I can’t even get into why this is a dumb perspective—as if you don’t already know why yourself! But I am mostly disgusted with his methods. Tonight he is supposed to be on Access Hollywood denouncing the use of fetal stem cells as murder. This is ACCESS HOLLYWOOD, people, not freaking Crossfire. All we want to hear out of your mouth, Gibson, when you are talking to Nancy is about your next “project” or what you are wearing. Now, I know it is a slippery slope out there in California—what with your governor being the Terminator and all—but let me be the one to tell you: no one wants to hear from you, Mel. We don’t give a rat’s ass about your political agenda. People just like your stupid movies. And this is not just because you are yet another uninformed celebrity, but because you are a religious nut/uninformed celebrity. I hope he is haunted by the ghost of Christopher Reeve for the rest of his life.