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Song Parodies -> "Memory Lane"

Original Song Title:

"Penny Lane"

Original Performer:

The Beatles

Parody Song Title:

"Memory Lane"

Parody Written by:

Lionel Mertens

The Lyrics

In Mem'ry Lane there is a mother sewing all she can
Her needle threads she's had her children at home
Now all the siblings have made their own
Pop has her alone

In the closet in the shadows lies a Tonka car
Her little children had and left behind to pack
And the shadows never hid the fact
Of life's growing pains, very strange

Mem'ry Lane strolls through the years and bridges lives
Steps between hello and long goodbyes
The trip's... a journey back

In Mem'ry Lane there is a father with a Shop-o-tools
And in his tool belt is a chalkline with blue string
He likes to keep his shop sparkling clean
Not a speck is seen

Mem'ry Lane cuts passed the tears and helps them dry
A father's bench a mother's pie
A treasure... going back

Up in the attic there's a spider spinning cob-webs on old ornaments
The Christmas cheer is catching flies with it's fray
So goes the deal when Santa is delayed
He'll come anyway

In Mem'ry Lane the mother sews another buttoner*
She sees the shadows lurking waiting rather dim
And then the father hobbles in
With his groooooin! pain, very strange

Mem'ry Lane strolls through the years and bridges lives
Steps between hello and long goodbyes
The trips a journey back
Mem'ry Lane cuts through tears and helps them dry
A father's bench a mother's pie
Mem'ry Lane
* disk for holding clothes together: a flat and usually round piece of plastic or other material on a piece of clothing that fits into a slit or loop on another part and holds the two parts together
Encarta ® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1998-2004 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

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 LittleLots
Matches Pace of
Original Song: 
How Funny: 
Overall Score: 



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Voting Results

 
Pacing: 4.5
How Funny: 4.2
Overall Rating: 4.7

Total Votes: 6

Voting Breakdown

The following represent how many people voted for each category.

    Pacing How Funny Overall Rating
 1   0
 1
 0
 
 2   0
 0
 0
 
 3   0
 0
 1
 
 4   3
 1
 0
 
 5   3
 4
 5
 

User Comments

Comments are subject to review, and can be removed by the administration of the site at any time and for any reason.

Royce Miller - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
Excellent, full of meaning.
Jason - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
Very good Lionel, except Memory has 3 syllables and Penny has 2. And removing a syllable from Memory (Mem'ry) looks a bit weird me, hence 4 for pacing.
Paul Robinson - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
Jason, actually I think you're off base on that call. As long as the imposed contraction works with the pacing and would sing through cleanly I don't see a reason not to use them in a piece. In some places around the world people (including some folks in Great Britain, where the Beatles were from, you know) say words structured like "Memory" with a contracted emphasis. Anyway, that's my 2 cents + on that. BUT, Lionel...you do have a pacing problem here...it's just one place, but you missed the mark on your line with the "...spider spinning cob-webs...". It's got way too many syllables to match up with the OS. 18 as opposed to 14. Buttinsky that I am I would suggest "Up in the attic spider spins cob-webs on ornaments" It matches the 14 OS syllables and when sung it has that same nice "bouncy" element the OS lines have in this song. It happens that when I did a piece with this OS I remember nearly doing the same type of thing in that place. So I'm giving you a "4-5-5" for that. I really love the story here, though...Your song really has a great feel for "memories"...and you picked a perfect OS to express that in, what with "Penny Lane" having the sound and feel we associate with songs from a particular bygone era. You fix that one line and this is a fantastic piece.
alvin rhodes - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
i like the feel of this one
Sir Bertram the Sword-Dropper - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
Please please PLEAZE insert some jokes in your next parody, Lionel. Sometimes, jokes are too sophisticated for my crude brain to register them immediately, but I read this one over, and over, and backwards and shuffled it around and it didn't score with me. So a 1 for funny, but ain't them the breaks?
Red Ant - July 14, 2006 - Report this comment
Contracting "memory" to 2 syllables is perfetly fine with me; most OSs that have "memory" as a lyric are sung that way anyway, just like "every" is almost always sung as 2 syllables (exceptions "The Boxer" and "Crimson and Clover" come to mind). I agree with Paul on the line he mentioned as not scanning, and this didn't quite hit "profound" with me, so 445 is my vote.
Agrimorfee - July 17, 2006 - Report this comment
FWIW, it depends on how the music is written whether one sings "mem-Ry" or "Mem-OR-Ry". The music calls for a 2-beat word or words to fill the space, and that's how Lionel wrote it. That being said, there are other pacing issues, as Red Ant mentions. As to being funny, this is the purposely non-funny parody style, and it works; you would do Adagio proud with this Lionel. 455.

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