So basically there was these people in Sweden who would do covers of popular songs but pitch it and change the lyrics to ”smurf” and they had kids in a chokehold. They released new albums every year for decades, selling so many albums and appearing on charts. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of this phenomena before but everyone I know grew up just listening to smurf hits on repeat. I still find songs like wow I’ve only heard this in ”smurf format” before.
There are hundreds of these songs if you wanna go into a rabbit hole just search ”smurf hits” on spotify. They would even cover sexual themed songs and make it into a kids song by switching words like ”fuck” into ”smurf”
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WTH did I just read?
We had Ministars and OndaChoc, which were essentially covers of popular national and international pop and rock songs with lyrics rewritten for kid/tween audiences. Also super weird.
Yep, those were very popular when I was a kid in Norway. I often knew the smurf versions (in Norwegian) of the songs before I even heard the original (often English) songs.
Not as covers but there is the infamous Vader Abraham and his smurf songs from the 70’s
Vader Abraham happens to be a right wing asshole who wants to send a whole bunch people out of the country but even if he didn’t have that going against him the [smurf song](https://youtu.be/I9bhmB1j8-c) is just anoying as all hell and he’s also the writer of the absolute worst song we ever send in for Eurovision.
Yeah, [the smurfs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UctxMNPF0Xs)
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Sueño contigo. [Original](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0d9-U9s4KNM) – [Smurfs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LKI7K37kc0)
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Cotton Eye Joe [Original](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOYZaiDZ7BM) – [Smurfs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD_yPGeZmjU)
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But it looks like they only released 2 albums (released in 1995 and 1996) and 4 singles here in Spain. And yes, they changed the lyrics too
I remember having 1 or 2 german smurf hits albums as a child in the early 2000s. They followed the same pattern of covering popular songs but changing the lyrics to something kids friendly.
They definitely weren’t as popular here as you described about Sweden tho.
Fucking yes.
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Let’s face it, you, Danes, Norwegians, Swiss, Dutchies, Austrians, we, I’m not sure about the Finns and Belgians, but we have in a certain time, I would say mid-1990 to mid-2020, we often consume similar media. In my childhood, Pettson and Findus or you call him Mulle Meck, we call him Willy Werkel, are famous. In Tyskland the Smurfs are called Schlümpfe and the various Smurfs hits have won 9 gold records in Germany.
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Smurf Hits in German:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljmxXZqJXEk&list=PL68ACB0C4CF6EF28A&index=2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljmxXZqJXEk&list=PL68ACB0C4CF6EF28A&index=2)
For Americans, think of kidzpop, but all the lyrics have been smurfed (changed to Smurf themed ones)
And yes, in Finland we had them (or maybe still have?) There were over 20 volumes if I remember correctly, and they started out as c-cassetes, then continued with CD:s. I still remember some Smurf lyrics before the actual lyrics of the songs
Edit to add. I actually still kind of like them. They don’t try to just make the songs kid friendly and always fail like kidzpop does, but change them completely. At least in Finnish the lyrics are kinda good
Of course! There are also songs, where the smurf lyrics just pop in my mind rather than the original. When I was a kid, it was everywhere!
This one is certainly the most famous. Jája, the smurf girl, is playing hide and seek and hides in the corner of a cesspit! I can’t not sing it, while the original plays.
https://youtu.be/bEL76NYO-gs
There are many more, even though they are harder to find nowadays and I remember only two or three albums as a kid, but there were more later.
The first lyricist was actually a frontman of a famous punk and pub-rock czech band.
Those Smurf hits were definitely a think in the UK too – I remember having one of their cassette tapes as a kid! The only other UK-specific example that comes to mind is Pinky and Perky: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinky_and_Perky https://youtu.be/ZMw5jzO_lv0