Lyrics hard to make out?

Question

Hi there,

This might not be one of your usual questions and it might sound a bit odd as well but here goes.

I listen to a lot of songs, have been listening all my life... I am not a native speaker though (as you most probably already figured out from my post) and 95% of the time when I am listening to a new song, I find it nearly impossible to make out what the vocalist is singing. It gets really really frustrating at times because I gotta have the lyrics googled up to really enjoy the song. Is this normal or am I just a bit retarded

?

PS I'd appreciate it if you could correct any grammatical mistakes in that post...

RayH · Accepted Answer

I don't see any grammatical mistakes. I fact, if you hadn't mentioned that you're not a native speaker I would have assumed that you were. The one thing that a native speaker probably would not say is "in that post" it should be "in this post."

As for song lyrics I suspect that most people have trouble at least some of the time, I certainly do. The only help for it is either repeated, careful listening (which may or may not work) or, as you say, good old Google (of course the lyrics posted on the Web aren't always 100% correct either).

Kooyeen · Answer

It depends on the kind of music and the singer. I am not a native speaker either, and I always have a lot of trouble, but I noticed that I am improving little by little. Pop music is the most simple to understand, but if you listen to heavy metal it becomes almost impossible, often even for native speakers. It becomes impossible enough for me, LOL.

I have always been interested in native speakers' comprehension of English, because I have always wanted to know what they really understand (whether we consider movies, or music, or speakers of other dialects, etc.)
Ok, you know what? I am gonna do a little test then

To native speakers (or non native speakers too): listen and then tell us how difficult you find to understand these lyrics. No cheating! And maybe give details, like "I had to listen to it more than once", or "I have to grab my headphones and put them on", etc. Enjoy!

S.P.I. · Answer

I have personally always found it really hard to understand Iron Maiden songs without the lyrics googled up. Which is quite sad considering how their songs when heard in the right sequence tell quite a dramatic story

Pop, as you said, is kinda easy as the songs usually have a pretty mild tempo.

To answer your question, I understood bits of the song on my first try but I had to dig out the lyrics to make out the rest of the stuff

S.P.I. · Answer

And thank you for correcting that last bit Ray. Appreciate it.

Lyrics hard to make out?

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