Eddie Money really hit it right ON the money in his song “Wanna Be A Rock-n-Roll Star!” So many of us really do live out our fantasies of being world-famous mega rock stars. I know this is true because I have seen many performances on the stages … of our automobiles. Admit it — you sing along to your favorite tunes while driving. I know you do! I do, too! We crank up the volume on the radio, our hands become drumsticks as we tap out the beat on the steering wheel drum set and we assume the identity of a . . . Steven Tyler, Mick Jagger, Jimmy Page, Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, Jerry Garcia, Tom Petty, Bob Dylan or ANYONE! But . . . be honest . . . do you REALLY know the lyrics? Let’s examine this a bit.

A few years ago, while driving along in my new car, I contacted OnStar to request a map download.

“Certainly, Mrs. West, we’ll send those directions to your navigation system right now. You will be guided, step-by-step, in just a few minutes,” advised the polite voice through the speaker near the OnStar button, “Is there anything else we can help you with today?”

“Nope. Thanks!” I answered, completely satisfied with this new service that I hadn’t enjoyed in my old car, “I’m good! Have a GREAT day!” And with that, I turned up the volume on Sirius Radio, Channel 26, Classic Rewind, and began singing along with The Kingsmen.

“Louie, Louie, Oh, Baby, We gotta go!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

Every night and day we sail the sea

We think of girls uh-constantly . . . .”

I love that song so much! I became the lead singer of the band, my voice, several registers lower than my natural speaking voice and MUCH more gravelly. Because I was by myself, my rock star persona blossomed! I assumed the accent of a Jamaican Rastafarian and I sang and sang and sang like no one was watching . . . or listening!

“Um . . . Excuse me, Mrs. West?” came a voice from out of nowhere.

“AAAAAAH! Oh my God!!! Who’s talking to me?” I shrieked, startled out of my character, craning my neck to check the back seat for stowaways and holding onto the wheel tightly, hoping desperately not to crash into anything.

“This is OnStar,” said the voice, trying as hard as she could to stifle her laughter, “you have to disconnect OnStar when you are finished; otherwise, we stay in the car with you!”

“Oh . . . SH*T!” I exclaimed, feeling my face instantly flush. “O.K., bye!” I said, clicking the OnStar button as fast as I could.

<Oh, my GOSH!!!!! I can’t believe OnStar just heard me singing! Wow!! How funny is that?! I wonder how many other operators were there listening! I’ll bet they get a lot of laughs over this for a L-O-N-G time . . . especially because I don’t even know the right words! I wonder if they tape all their calls?!>

 Suffice it to say, OnStar has been used VERY sparingly, if at all since then! I’m afraid of them!

My Uncle Jim once thought that people who listen to rock-and-roll would be excellent resources for the Pentagon, FBI and CIA for decoding secret, cryptic international espionage messages because they can understand the lyrics. I beg to differ. People who listen to rock-‘n-roll can decipher a good portion of the lyrics, but there are some gaps. Take, for example, Eric Clapton’s song, “I Shot the Sheriff.” For many years, I sang

I shot the sherry

But I did not shoot the deputy!

My young mind never thought anything about it! Having watched season upon season, episode upon episode of such TV shows as Bonanza, Wyatt Earp and The Rifleman, I just pictured Clapton in a saloon, confessing that he chugged a shot or two of sherry, drew his six-shooter, then pulled the trigger, killing the deputy, but sparing the sheriff! Never once did it dawn on me that cowboys do NOT imbibe such sophisticated and refined aperatifs as sherry, so . . . “I shot the sherry/but did not shoot the deputy” became the lyrics that I knew.

My parents loved folk-singer, Roger Miller. The Wurlitzer hi-fi in our living room spun his records, streaming his songs throughout our house as constant background music. One of my favorites was “England Swings.” Since I was still so young and played with dolls, it should be noted that I made rapid and facile use of baby terminology. “Boppies,” in our household, meant pacifiers that mothers use to calm babies. I used boppies with my dolls; therefore, the lyrics of “England Swings,” while a little unusual, made some sort of sense to my eight-year-old self:

England swings like a pendulum do,

Boppies on bicycles, two by two!”

 Admittedly, the notion of two pacifiers riding on bicycles (rather than British police, bobbies) is a bit strange, but then again, no stranger than the lyrics in John Lennon’s “Come Together:”

Here come old flat-top

He come groovin’ up slowly

He got joo-joo eyeball

He one holy roller

He got hair down to his knee

Got to be a joker he just do what he please

 

He wear no shoeshine

He got toe-jam football

He got monkey finger

He shoot Coca-Cola

 WHAT?????!!!!!!  What. Does. That. Even. Mean??? After all that, two pacifiers riding on bikes in London IS nothing weird, right? Of course not!! The next song on Roger Miller’s album was “Chug-a-lug” about him and a friend finding a moonshine still in a forest down South while on a 4-H field trip, so again, maybe Roger Miller and his friends got drunk and wrote the lyrics to “England Swings!” You never know!

My older brother had a collection of Rolling Stones LPs. I listened to “Honky-Tonk Woman” enough to know I got the lyrics right, but . . . with a name like Mary Margaret, living in an extremely sheltered environment (to say the least) contributed to my naiveté and prevented me from understanding them. I just thought they were disgusting:

I met a gin-soaked bar room queen in Memphis

… She blew my nose and then she blew my mind!

 Why would ANYONE want to blow someone else’s nose? I have to be honest . . . It wasn’t until about a year ago that I had the “Aha” moment and understood the cocaine metaphor! For all of my life (minus one year) I thought that an alcohol-drenched and drunken member of some royal family met Mick Jagger in a bar, took her hankie out of her cleavage and helped him blow his nose! Did he have a cold or allergies or something? NO!!!! NOW I get it!!! Some drunk guy in Tennessee, dressed in drag, gave Mick Jagger some drugs and then . . . . did they have sex? Still not sure, but probably!

Uncle Jim sure had it ALL wrong, didn’t he!! If I had been employed to “help” the Pentagon, FBI or CIA to decode messages, the United States would be at serious risk! I know I’m not alone in confusing lyrics, though. Even Phoebe Buffay from the long-running Friends sitcom admitted her misunderstanding of Elton John’s lyrics to “Tiny Dancer.” “Hold me closer, Tony Danza,” she’d sing. And now . . . for me, those have become the lyrics I sing! Other people mix up lyrics, too! When Heidi and I were in Europe a few years ago on our best ever, five-country road trip, we tuned into Cherie-FM every day. One of the most popular songs aired at that time was Daft Punk and Pharrell Williams’ collaborative song, “Get Lucky.” We heard it at least six times a day, so naturally, we became familiar enough with the lyrics to sing along; howEVER, we mistook the written lyrics for our own, convoluted version! Rather than “we’re up all night to get lucky,” WE sang, “we hope to get Mexican lucky!” WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN????? What is “Mexican lucky?” Is it different from any other culture’s luck? If so, how? We didn’t know, but we sang it, nevertheless!

Some misunderstandings of lyrics can be attributed to poor pronunciation on the artists’ parts, but what about those who have precise diction, like Elton John? He speaks The King’s English after all. His lyrics should be easily understood, and most of them are, but what about the refrain of “Rocket Man?” Here’s MY version:

And I think it’s gonna be a long, long time

‘Til touchdown brings me ’round again to find

I’m not the man they think I am at all

No, No, No, Nooooo

I’m a Rocket Man

ROCKET MAN

Runnin’ on the fumes of evermore!

 “Fumes of evermore?” Really?!!! WHAT ARE FUMES OF EVERMORE???? I don’t know, but the syllables match and the words sort of sound right!  What are the true lyrics? Do you EVEN know?! Check ’em out:

And I think it’s gonna be a long, long, time

‘Til touchdown brings me ’round again to find

I’m not the man they think I am at home

Oh, no no no

I’m a rocket man

Rocket man

Burnin’ out this fuse up here alone!

 O.K. WhatEVER. Perhaps all of us Baby Boomers should band together and head on out to the new epic concert, The Desert Trip, this summer in Indio to relive our Woodstock years — own version of Coachella. We’ll enjoy all the old bands with whom we grew up: The Who, The Rolling Stones, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan and other greats. They can sing their lyrics and we can sing ours! Boy, oh boy! Eddie Money KNEW we all “Wanna Be Rock-‘n-Roll Stars.”