‘Cold As Ice’ Has Hidden Vocals That Don’t Make Any Sense
While listening to an isolated vocal track of Foreigner's Cold As Ice, we noticed something that was very much out of place.
Mick Jones, who formed Foreigner in 1976, wrote Cold As Ice with Lou Gramm. He told Songfacts about the background of the song.
"Subconsciously you draw from stuff, things that happened in your past, things that came out of relationships, the pain and the heartache of love that is intense and then so deep, and then suddenly you lose it," Jones said. "The whole gamut of emotional feeling that you go through in a relationship. Sometimes they end, and sometimes they last, and when it's the final breakup, you're left with the memories of that relationship. So I go for that quite a bit. You're kind of digging down deep into your well of significant things that you recall from sometimes near tragedy that you go through at the time."
What he didn't explain was the background vocals at the end of the song, just after the post-guitar solo breakdown.
I always heard the background as the band just singing "Cold As Ice" over and over again behind Lou Gramm.
Here's a refresher, and pay attention at the 2:25 mark.
If you didn't catch it, they don't sing "Cold As Ice" over and over again.
First, they sing the words "Paradise," then they go to "Pay The Price."
Then, as if someone said "Let's throw something random in there that sounds like 'Cold As Ice." Nobody will notice," the background vocals just sing the words "Three Blind Mice."
Who decided that "Three Blind Mice" fits in with this song?
I mean, I went almost 45 years not knowing that was even in the song, so I suppose they kept things interesting for themselves without it getting out there.