Badder than a whooping cough

The story:

I sang this at a karaoke bar and I was so sure that I knew the chorus that I didn't even bother looking at the words on the screen. When I said whooping cough, people started looking at me funny and laughed--at that point I just wanted find out what was so weird. After the song, someone asked me why I said whooping cough. I said because someone had told me it wasn't "badder than a hooking call." I mean what else could it be?