Back on Christmas day I was groovin’ off my Christmas playlist which, by a law that I made up, must always start with This Christmas by Donny Hathaway. Shake a hand, shake a hand, y’all. Other joints include Christmas in Hollis by Run DMC, What Child is this by Vanessa Williams (not just for her but for that cool intro), Kurtis Blow’s Christmas Rappin’ and multiple James Brown seasonal gems. The James Brown songs make my eyes a bit misty since he passed on Christmas day a few years ago. Not “Soulful Christmas” because you CAN’T feel bad listening to that. But “Santa Claus Go Straight To The Ghetto”? It hits even harder now.
So there’s a part near the end of the song that I couldn’t figure out. He says “Tell ’em **unidentified** told you so” but I couldn’t figure out what the name is. Don’t ask why I’m just noticing this after all these years. Whatever it is, the name definitely isn’t James Brown. I decided to hit the lyric sites to see what they say. Not only did they claim that he said “James Brown” there but they don’t even have the obvious parts of the song right. Unless I have some alternate version of the song, these lyric sites have messed the song up. Many seem to copy and paste the same mistakes over again. Here’s a few:
“Pitch up your reindeer”
… Naw. I’m betting that’s “Hitch up your reindeer” and that James Brown didn’t tell Santa to throw an entire reindeer at a baseball player.
“Leave a toy for Johnny. Leave a dog for Mary.”
It sounds like “Leave a dawl for Mary.” If you listen closely, it sounds like there’s an “ll” at the end.
“You know that I know that you will see”
It’s “You know that I know WHAT you will see.” It’s not even hard to tell that he says that.
“And every stockings you buy,
The kids are gonna love you.
So, pick up a stocking you find.”
**rubs eyes** For one thing, he says “Fill every stocking you find.” I can tell that he’s saying that even through my crappy speakers. And the way that second line should go is “The kids are gonna love you so.” He doesn’t pause before saying “so” and a long pause after it. That means the period is after so, not before it. Not many people say “Love you so” in music these days, so I can understand the mistake… a bit.
There’s a few other times that I’ve noticed fubared lyrics on these sites. Some rap song made a reference to Alvin Ailey and whoever posted the lyrics just had some weird jibberish where Ailey’s name should have been. I wonder if there’s a really good lyric site out there that isn’t completely laced-up with the dumbs.
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