Misheard Lyrics

One of my students recently came to class with an important request:

Gau, I studied English all weekend! I felt so motivated! I focused on listening to different songs!

But can you help me with “Rolling in the Deep” by Adele? I tried so hard, but I can’t understand some parts and got very frustrated! 😭

I’m sure you’ve probably heard the song before, but have another listen if you like!

I love working with music in class, and Adele is an incredible vocalist, so I was VERY excited… until I realized that I myself didn’t understand some of the lyrics. 🙈

Fever pitch

One of my favorite parts is right at the beginning:

“There’s a fire starting in my heart
Reaching a fever pitch, it’s bringing me out the dark”.

Those last words (“it’s bringing me out the dark”) sound so beautiful because that is not how we would express that idea in everyday conversational English! Those lyrics are poetic because they’re unusual. They’re out of the ordinary.

Adele makes you stop for a second to interpret what she means to say. In this song, she is very angry at an unfaithful partner. The darkness could be interpreted as a negative emotion that is coming to surface (maybe sadness, anger, or disappointment), but it could also refer to the ignorance that she was living in because of her partner’s secret. In English, we would say that you’re “in the dark,” if there is something important that you don’t know. In this context, her anger may be bringing her out from the dark.

As I read the lyrics, I also realized that I didn’t know exactly what Adele meant by fever pitch. It’s just not a phrase I’m familiar with. 🙃 While I understand the meaning of the words within the context of the song (because context is everything), I was sent running to the dictionary!

fever pitch (noun)
: a state of intense excitement and agitation

— Merriam-Webster (2023)

1000 queer sheep

Now it should come to no surprise that there are YouTubers who poke fun at the song because some of the lyrics are hard to hear or understand! Don’t believe me?

The background vocals for the song are in parentheses and in red:

I can’t help feeling…
We could’ve had it all
(You’re gonna’ wish you)
(Never had met me)
Rolling in the deep
(Tears are gonna fall)
(Rolling in the deep)

— Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” (correct lyrics)

But here’s what many of us are now hearing thanks to comical videos like the one above 🤭:

I can’t help feeling…
We could’ve had it all
(A thousand queer sheep)
(Never had bare feet)
Rolling in the deep
(Pigeon carnivore)
(Rolling in the deep)

— the misheard lyrics

Spot any differences?

Enjoy the ride!

Mishearing lyrics isn’t necessarily a bad thing! It means that our brains are hard at work trying to help us understand something that has us “in the dark”. In cases like the one above, mistakes in interpretation can even be quite entertaining!

As language learners, we sometimes get very worked up because we want to understand every word of all we hear, read and see. For some people, this can turn into a bit of an obsession as it represents the unobtainable goal at the end of the tunnel.

But understanding 100% of everything is simply impossible! I mean, do you understand the lyrics to all pop songs in your first language? Of course not! Fortunately, there are so many websites online to help us learn the words to our favorite melodies. 😊

So let’s all remember to relax and enjoy the ride! Not understanding everything is an important part of the adventure! There may be a hidden lesson here that goes beyond learning a language, but I’ll let you decide what it is for yourself. ❤️

Now let’s have a laugh with some more misheard lyrics, shall we? 🥳

Out in the wild…

Do you know of any other lyrics (in English or another language) that people often mis-hear or mis-sing?

I would love for you to share them below! 💖