Overkill

I like music. My tastes are all over the place, but for the most part I like songs that I can sing to when I am alone in my car.

If you grew up as a child of the 80’s, like I did, you may be familiar with the band Men at Work. Their videos were on MTV and they were quite popular. Although, I have to admit there was only one person that I knew in middle school, that actually claimed she was a fan and that was my friend Tara*. We used to mock her for liking Men At Work, because seriously, how could you like a band like that, when there were bands like Asia , Styx and Foreigner?

Anyway, Colin Hay, the lead singer of Men at Work, did an acoustic version of the Song Overkill for something or other, that ended up on the TV show Scrubs soundtrack CD. I listen to that CD all the time because it has a great mix of songs that I can belt out, to and from work.

The Overkill lyrics start with:

“I can’t get to sleep,
I think about the implications,
Of diving in too deep,
and possibly the complications.”

If you are familiar with this song you are probably singing it to yourself right now. The song is about laying awake at night feeling stressed out.

The chorus of the song is:

“Day after Day it appears,
Night after night my heartbeat shows the fear,
Nurse a beer and fade away.
Come back another day.”

Yesterday while driving to work, I didn’t feel like singing. I just listened. As the chorus part played my face reddened with the flush of embarrassment. I was embarrassed for myself and at myself.

The lyrics are “Ghosts appear and fade away.”

NOT “Nurse a beer and fade away.”

I have been singing this song incorrectly for a couple of years now.

Have you ever done that? What song and lyrics have you messed up?


*Dear Tara,
About two years ago I ended up buying the Best of Men At Work CD and I really like it. You were ahead of your time. I apologize about ridiculing your taste in music, except Duran Duran. I still think they suck.