Thought Press.

I promise this will be my last grammar post! A while ago I was listening to my Sirius radio in the car and this Christian song by Big Tent Revival came on. I looked at the display and saw this: “Two Sets of Jones’“. I could not believe it!

Jones’ is the possessive form, as in, “that’s the Jones’ house.” If there are more than one Jones, you add an es to the end. So if there are two families named Jones you may say, “here come the Joneses!” If one family was coming toward you, you’d say, “here come the Jones.” — Or, it can be argued that it is correct to say “Joneses” if it’s a single Jones family. Names ending in s can cause confusion over pluralizing rules. Both ways for a single family work:

“Why do we have to grow up? I know more adults who have the child’s approach to life. They’re people who don’t give a hang what the Joneses do.” - Walt Disney

Back to this incorrect song title. I could not believe that a song title would be wrong. I immediately called the station and left a voicemail, explaining that the apostrophe makes Jones possessive and that adding an es creates more than one Jones. I said that grammar is one of our most important dying arts. It’s true.

After this call, I never thought anything would be changed since it’s the official title of a song, but, to my amazement, a couple weeks later I hear the song come on and the displayed title on my satellite radio says: “Two Sets of Joneses“!

Take a look at Google’s music page for this song. You will see the official song title does in fact have Jones’.