Being both a song lyricist and a grammarian, I notice the obvious grammar errors in popular song lyrics, as I am sure you do as well. Are they intentional? Who knows? Should they be corrected? Probably not. Let’s look at some of those lyrics.

Although Lie, Lady, Lie is proper grammar, I find that 99.99 percent of people say “I am going to lay down,” rather than the correct “lie down.” Does the song sound better the way it is because we are used to hearing it that say, or does it just sound better period? Lay, lady, and lay all have the same long a sound. Maybe that is why it sounds good. The lyrics were written by Bob Dylan, who probably knew better, and many renditions of the title and the song lyrics do use the commas, which are correct: “Lay, Lady, Lay.”

Most of the time, I don’t care if the grammar is incorrect in a song. But this one in particular really bothers me, and I do like the song: It is “Do Wah Diddy Diddy” by Manfred Mann. It was written by very prolific and well-known songwriters Ellie Greenwich and Jeff Barry, and I see no reason for the blatant grammar goof, “I know we was falling in love.” Yuck!

Bobbie Gentry had a hit with “Bobby McGee,” written by Kris Kristofferson and Fred Foster (don’t know Fred). It contains the phrase “good enough for me and Bobby McGee.”  Would “good enough for Bobby McGee and me”  have had the same rhythm? Maybe not.

Well, we all know to avoid double negatives. Did Mick Jagger and Keith Richards know that when they wrote 
“I Can’t Get No Satisfaction”? I bet they did, but there is just something funny sounding about “I Can’t Get Any Satisfaction.” And there is an extra syllable, which ruins the accents.

Never use ain’t? Bill Withers did when he wrote and sang “Ain’t No Sunshine.” Then he added a double negative in the line “and this house just ain’t no home.”

I have never heard of songwriters Terry Britten and Graham Hamilton Lyle, but  we have all heard of Tina Turner, who sang “What’s Love Got to Do with It?”  Got is actually the past tense of get and is often incorrectly used instead of have ( as in We don’t got any.) What’s love have to do with it sounds funny, but it may be because we are used to hearing it with got. I think we all might agree that grammar mistakes often give a song the edge that it needs.

Stefani Germanotta and Nadir Khayat wrote “Bad Romance” for Lady Gaga. You and me could write a bad romance? Most people would probably say it that way anyway. Obviously it should be you and I, but at least it doesn’t say me and you! (which would also sound okay and be wrong.)

In “Hungry Eyes,” Eric Carmen sings, “I feel the magic between you and I.” The song was written by John Denicola and Franke Previte, whom I have never heard of.  The rhyming words in the verse are disguise and eyes. I is a much closer match than me! However, it is always correct to say between you and me, although once again 99.99 percent of us . . . 

Wow! It took nine songwriters to not know about the subjunctive mood! In Rich Girl, Gwen Stefani sings, “If I was a rich girl…” Well, Stefani is actually a rich girl, but in the song, she apparently isn’t, so were should be used rather than was to indicate something that isn’t the case. Thank you, Sheldon Harnick and Lewis Bock Jerrold, for writing “If I Were a Rich Man” from Fiddler on the Roof. And as for Andre Young, Chantal Kreviazuk, Eve Jeffers, Gwen Stefani, Jerry Bock, Kara Dioguardi, Mark Batson, Mike Elizondo, and  Sheldon Harnick, I have two words for you: subjunctive mood.

If you do a search for song lyrics with grammatical mistakes, you will usually find among them, “I Feel Good” by James Brown, written by James Brown. Those websites say it should be “I Feel Well.” Ah, no! It actually an be either. Grammatically speaking, feel can be an emotion or an action. When feel is an emotion, we follow it with an adjective. When feel is an action we use an adverb. Feel in this case is an emotion and should be followed by the adjective good. If you feel well, that technically means your fingertips are sensitive and do a good job of feeling things. However, we will give those websites a break because I feel well is accepted just because well is also used to indicate a state of health. But, I Feel Good is correct.