Leaning up against the “record machine”?
Seriously?
Exactly how backwoods are we talkin’ here?
Carrie Underwood’s song, “Cowboy Casanova” re-defines the definition of hick.
Guess I’m just not a “cool drink of water”…
What’s a jukebox?
(aside: well, that was weird. She’s singing about a seventeen year old. When I had this as a 45, seventeen was old.)
The line in “I love rock and roll” is a reference to:
Chuck Berry, “Little Queenie”, 1959
So she’s quoting a quote: very postmodern, not at all “hick”.
Hey, if the term “record machine” is okay with Van Halen, it’s okay with me.
Yeah, but have you seen Junior’s grades?!
What’s a “record”?
(I keed, I keed…I’m 42)
For many years I thought the line was “I have my back against the wrecking machine.” After I found out what it really meant it took me a while to realize he was talking about a jukebox.
The term was also used in Van Halen’s “Jump.”
Oh can’t you see me standing here,
I’ve got my back against the record machine
ETA: Ah, I see someone already beat me to it.
I always interpreted this lyric as a double entendre; a call-back to older songs with jukeboxes, but also referring to the music industry as a machine.
Speaking as a songwriter, I think pretty much all of those choices were made for the rhymes which could be derived from them more than anything else. Syllables too. Rhyme and time usually have more to do with specific word choices than any kind of intentional semantic nuance.