Songs with repeated lines of lyrics but one word changes each time

100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.

 

Baby shark doo doo doo doo doo doo
Mommy shark....
Granma shark...

And i have got it stuck in my head.

You can add surfin bird to the list. It qualifies. Probably the greatest song ever.

 

Crazy by Gnarls Barkley popped into my mind, but that's almost the opposite, where the main word stays the same and they change the helper words around it each time.

 

well, there's Lovett's LA County, where the phrase stays the same, but the referent shifts

 

I Dig A Pony? Although that's more about repeating phrases rather than single words. Dig It, same story.

Don't Think Twice, It's Alright sorta fits as well.

 

Margaritaville

 

I did this with a song about meeting and marrying my wife forty years ago. The first chorus ends with "The smile in her eyes said it all" and the last chorus shifts to "The smile in her eyes SAYS it all" to bring it into the present. Nifty twist.

Bob

 

Let It Bleed.

 

MY HUMAN GETS ME BLUES by Captain Beefheart

..."I saw you baby dancin' in your x-ray gingham dress
I knew you were under duress
I knew you were under yer dress"

 

a repetitive line in a poem or a song can be referred to as a refrain. Classic examples in poetry would be Edgar Allan Poe's "Annabel Lee" or Octavio Paz, "Wind Water Stone", where Paz ends each stanza with a refrain that is the three words in the Title - but in each stanza, he changes the order of the words Wind, water, stone.

Historically, a refrain and a chorus were used interchangeably, but from what I've read, a refrain is now used to refer to one or two repeating lines, whereas a chorus, we usually think of as repeating the whole 4 lines or however long it might be.

Altering the refrain slightly throughout a song is a device to keep a listener interested, IMO, because it works on changing your expectations. Lots of songwriters have used it - pick a genre or a writer and you can find examples, if you look for it.

for example:

Beatles - in Day Tripper:
In the chorus, for the first two times it appears:
She was a day tripper
One way ticket, yeah
but in the last chorus:
She was a day tripper
Sunday driver, yeah

James Taylor, Copperline:
in the pre-chorus, first time
Half a mile down to Morgan Creek
Leaning heavy on the end of the week
and in the last pre-chorus
Half a mile down to Morgan Creek
I'm only living for the end of the week

 

Gimme Shelter too.

 

Lyle Lovett had a Jazzy little number that is built around the idea the OP is talking about. Although the repeating phrase is at the end of the stanzas rather than the beginning and that repeating idea is the hook of the song. It's more of a narrative form with the repeats being the punchline.

 

R.E.M. - The One I Love

...a simple prop to occupy my time...another prop has occupied my time...

 

If I Had a Hammer/Bell.Song to Sing...

 

A variation on that: Amy Winehouse's Rehab:

They tried to make me go to Rehab
But I said no, no, no
Yes I've been black but when I come back
You'll know, know, know

 

Beatles - Here Comes the Sun here/clear

 

Old McDonald Had A Farm E I E I O

 

"Hard Rock Hammer" by Leon Fullerton.

 

A variation on aha's Take On Me:


Each time they sing the chorus Take On Me,
The next line is Take Me On,
back and forth