About This Quiz
We've all been there. We're driving down the freeway, and Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" comes on the radio. We crank the volume and belt out, "It doesn't make a difference if we're naked or not!" Wait, what? Whoa. That's not at all how that song goes! Are you confused? We were too. For the record, the line is, "It doesn't make a difference if we make it or not!" And that's far from the only song where we misunderstand the lyrics. Did you know Aretha Franklin's "Respect," doesn't go, "R-E-S-P-E-C-T/Take out TCP?" But, hey, we're having fun with it, so why does it matter?
It may come as a surprise (or not, if you have kids) then that there's an entire industry out there devoted to intentionally changing the lyrics of today's popular songs. Kidz Bop, which debuted in 2001, takes hits by the likes of Taylor Swift, Cardi B, Drake, One Direction and many more and swaps out the "scandalous" lyrics in favor of more kid-friendly words — sung by kids, of course. References to sex? Gone. Curse words? Out of here. Alcohol turned into water, like a miracle straight out of the Bible.
So, the real question here is, could you identify today's songs with more virtuous lyrics? Let's see if you've got what it takes to identify the real tune behind these kid-friendly versions.
Call it a miracle of Biblical proportions ... or just another lyric change courtesy of Kidz Bop. This time they changed liquor into water from these original lyrics: "Stop, wait a minute/Fill my cup, put some liquor in it."
No song with "cake" in the title would be complete without a lyric about frosting. DNCE's "Cake By The Ocean" is no exception, but we're not sure exactly why this one was changed. The original tune says, "See you licking frosting from your own hands."
Kidz Bop takes issues with "curves," apparently, subbing these lyrics in place of "Love your curves and all your edges/All your perfect imperfections." "All Of Me" was released by John Legend in 2013, part of his "Love In The Future" album.
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The song, "All About That Bass," actually goes, "Yeah, my momma she told me don't worry about your size/She says, "Boys, they like a little more booty to hold at night.'" Either way, we dig this self-love message.
Lil Nas X had an unexpected hit on his hands with this anthem that took over the airways in early 2019. A subsequent remix with country music star Billy Ray Cyrus was also a hit. The original song states, "My life is a movie/Bull ridin' and boobies/Cowboy hat from Gucci." Easy to see why they made the change.
All we can say about this one is ... gross. Macklemore's original "Thrift Shop" lyrics, "Probably should have washed this/It smells like R. Kelly's sheets," paints a pretty smelly picture of the singer's thrift store shopping experience.
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The Chainsmokers and Halsey get their location changed up by Kidz Bop in "Closer." The original says, "So baby pull me closer in the backseat of your Rover," while the edited version has the couple standing "against" the Rover. Much safer.
Nicki Minaj likely doesn't even recognize her own lyrics in this "Starships" tune released in 2012. In the original version, she sings, "We're higher than a motherf**ker." Whoops, sorry Nicki, that's not kid-friendly.
Post Malone & Swae Lee's "Sunflower" got hit several times with the Kidz Bop censor-o-meter, with these two lines, "Crash at my place, baby, you're a wreck," and "She wanna ride me like a cruise." The unedited version was used in "Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse."
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Kidz Bop prefers to keep it stateside in the song "Blank Space" by Taylor Swift. In the original, Swift sings, "Grab your passport and my hand/I can make the bad guys good for a weekend."
The original lyrics in "Story Of My Life" state: "She told me in the morning she don't feel the same about us in her bones." It seems to allude to a couple who has spent the night together ... probably not a G-rated situation.
Singer/songwriter Kesha released "TiK ToK" in 2009 with these lyrics: "Before I leave, brush my teeth with a bottle of Jack./'Cause when I leave for the night, I ain't coming back."
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Panic! at the Disco recorded "High Hopes" with these lyrics, "Had to have high, high hopes for a living/Shooting for the stars when I couldn't make a killing," but Kidz Bop subbed the phrase, "when you knew that I was willing," to get that "K" word out of there.
Even God isn't safe from the wrath of Kidz Bop, being removed from The Script's "Breakeven." The original lyrics: "I'm still alive but I'm barely breathin'/Just prayed to a God that I don't believe in." The edited lyrics are certainly more inclusive of other religions.
Justin Bieber is still sorry in the song of the same name, "Sorry." The original lyrics that were censored by Kidz Bop say, "'Cause I'm missing more than just your body." He's missing you either way, so that's good, right?
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Lorde's "Royals" was converted to a more kid-friendly version with the removal of a brand of liquor. The original line says, "But, every song is like gold teeth, Grey Goose, trippin' in the bathroom."
Ariana Grande's "7 Rings" is virtually unrecognizable in its Kidz Bop-adjusted state. The line, "Been through the baddest/It should be the saddest," is actually, "Been through some bad sh*t/I should be a sad b*tch." It's just one of several changes Kidz Bop made to this song.
Lady Gaga and Beyoncé made it to the club, but for a meal not "bubbly," in the Kidz Bop version of "Telephone." However, the real lyrics say, "Out in the club and I'm sippin' that bubb/And you're not gonna reach my telephone."
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"Youngblood" by 5 Seconds of Summer recounts the initial feelings early in a relationship that are no longer there. The first line of the song, "Remember the words you told me/Love me 'til the day I die," went decidedly less morbid in the Kidz Bop version with, "Love me 'til the day I fly." That's sort of the same, isn't it?
The Jonas Brothers' "Sucker" sees the group, "Dancing on top of cars and stumbling out of bars," while the Kidz Bop version is a little more vague about why the brothers are stumbling around. There's nothing worse than a kid singing about stumbling out of a bar, though.
We've got to admit: This change-up for Drake's "In My Feelings" is pretty strange. The original lyrics are, "TrapMoneyBenny, I buy you champagne, but you love some Henny." Henny, of course, refers to Hennessy. We've never seen anyone dancing to the Kidz Bop version, though.
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"The Heart Wants What It Wants" was a 2014 release by Selena Gomez, where the one-time girlfriend of Justin Bieber sang, "You got me sippin' on something." Kidz Bop thought, "You got me wishin' on something" sounded more kid-friendly.
"I didn't know that I was starving till I looked at you" took the place of, "I didn't know that I was starving till I tasted you," in the song "Starving" by Hailee Steinfeld. Kidz Bop also changed, "You do things to my body," to "You do things to my heartbeat." Hubba hubba.
Ariana Grande's song, "Love Me Harder," featuring The Weeknd, is a bit more risqué with its original lyrics, "Can you feel the pressure between your hips?" Kidz Bop cleaned it up to make it kid-friendly, but good luck explaining that title.
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Bruno Mars' collaboration with Cardi B on the song, "Finesse," was a frequent flyer on radio stations, making it a likely Kidz Bop choice. The original lyrics: "Blame it on my confidence/Oh, blame it on your measurements/Shut that sh*t down on sight/That's right."
Hey Maroon 5, Kidz Bop wants you to take her on a proper date, altering the lyrics of "Girls Like You" from "We spent the late nights/Making things right, between us." Late nights, date nights ... it's not one of Kidz Bop's more substantial alterations.
Cardi B liked her original lyrics, "They call me Cardi Bardi/Bangin’ body," enough to include them in her 2018 song, "I Like It," a collaboration with Bad Bunny and J Balvin. Kidz Bop, on the other hand, removed Cardi B's name altogether.
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"Without Me" by singer Halsey got the Kidz Bop treatment, turning "Feelin' so high" into "Feelin' so fly," and changing the word "demons" into "feelings" in the second phrase. "Without Me" was a single released from Halsey's forthcoming album, "Manic."
"Send My Love (To Your New Lover)" is a pretty strange song to get the Kidz Bop seal of approval, but once the title was changed to drop "(To Your New Lover)" altogether and some of the lyrics were altered such as, "You put your hands on, on my body," it was added to Kidz Bop 34.
"Eastside," a collaboration between Benny Blanco, Halsey and Khalid, actually is a lot more physical than the Kidz Bop lyrics lead you to believe. Here's the original, "Then we grew up, started to touch/Used to kiss underneath the light on the back of the bus." Scandalous!
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Flo Rida kicks off his "My House" song with this opening: "Open up the champagne, pop!" Conveniently, "Bop" and "pop" happen to rhyme. Kidz Bop also altered other parts of this song changing, for example, "Show me what you do now" to, "Show me how you dance now."
Shawn Mendes didn't know he was doing anything wrong when he sang, "Cross my heart and hope to die," in "I Know What You Did Last Summer," but Kidz Bop decided it needed to be cleaned up a bit, changing it to "Cross my heart and hope tonight."
It was "God's Plan," according to rapper/singer Drake, when he wrote, 'Don't pull up at 6 a.m. to cuddle with me." But, Kidz Bop had other ideas, shifting that line to "Don't pull up at 6 a.m. to talk here with me."
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It's not hard to see why Kidz Bop sanitized DJ Khaled's "I'm The One" for a younger, more impressionable audience. Lil Wayne's original lyric, "When she on the molly, she a zombie," is a pretty upfront drug reference. Quavo and Chance the Rapper were axed from the song altogether.
Kidz Bop took the alcohol away from Ed Sheeran in "Sing," with original lyrics that stated, "I told her my name and said, ‘It's nice to meet ya'/And then she handed me a bottle of water with tequila." The edited version is drink-free and, also, we'd say, much more friendly.