Does it help to know that the full lyric is:
"We’re living in a powder keg and giving off sparks "
So, they’re in a volatile situation?
Okay, I have to add my interpretation: “Be quiet, sit down, quiet”
And another vote for “Four hundred children.”
I’ll add “Groovin’” by the Young Rascals. Always thought it was “You and me and Leslie” (“endlessly” is correct, for those who haven’t heard it.)
This one is more excusable because “tush” is a word known only in a narrow dialect group. Unless you are a part of that social group you’d have to have it explained to you by someone in the know.
Heck, pretty much any ZZ Top sailed right over my head as a kid.
Pearl Necklace:
She was gettin’ bombed,
And I was gettin’ blown away,
And she held it in her hand
And this is what she had to say:
A pearl necklace.
She wanna pearl necklace.
She wanna pearl necklace.
Tube Snake Boogie:
I got a girl, she lives on the hill.
She won’t do it but her sister will,
When she boogie,
She do the tube snake boogie.
Well now boogie little baby,
Boogie woogie all night long.
La Grange:
Rumor spreadin’ a-'round in that Texas town
‘bout that shack outside La Grange
and you know what I’m talkin’ about.
Just let me know if you wanna go
to that home out on the range.
They gotta lotta nice girls ah.
And so on. ZZ Top are some dirty MFers.
Wait, it’s not?
I mean, I took it to mean essentially the same thing, but really? That’s tush?
:eek: I could have sworn it was “You and me and Leslie” Ignorance fought.
Well, I was just thinking about it and tush is probably short for tushy, what parents call their little kids bottoms, backsides, behinds, derrieres, ect…
So I’m interpreting it as Billy wanting a piece of ass.
I think the confusion is that he’s singing it so that tush rhymes with much and so he’s kind of pronouncing tush as touch.
Uh… yeah. I figured it out once I finally heard “powder keg” clearly. I just didn’t think the lyric was much better than having her be a spazz.
“Tush” is not “tushy” or ass. “Tush” is a dialect word meaning “adequate.” I believe I’ve heard interviews with Billy Gibbons in which he said that among themselves they would rate women on the scale of tush, plush, and primo. So when they’re “just looking for some tush,” that means they’re horny enough so that any adequate-looking woman will do, rather than holding out for a plush or a primo chick.
I didn’t realize that. Thank you for the explanation.
NVM…someone beat me to it
:o
for several years i thought he meant a warm gun was a syringe.
I thought I heard that it was rumored to be about the Church of Satan. Supposedly you can even see Anton Lavey staring down from the second floor of the hotel on the inside of the album. Probably just an urban legend, though. I prefer the idea that it’s about a creepy hotel to the notion that it’s about substance abuse. Creepy hotels are cool.
Christian fundamentalists say it’s about the Church of Satan. Apparently on the back or inside cover there’s a woman who they say is witch. In an interview Glenn Frey said it was just some woman they got off the street to be in the picture.
Speaking of misheard lyrics,
In the Jimi Hendrix song “Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire”, going into the break, does he or does he not say,
But whenever I’ve seen the lyrics it’s always “Get it on baby”. But the rhythm of the words really sounds like it’s the other way.
Paul Simons Kodachrome. I thought the lyrics were, “Mama’s gonna take my combs and throw 'em all away.”
I thought, why would his mom wanna throw his combs out? Doesn’t she want him to have neatly combed hair? Especially in the hippy 70’s when most boys had long hair.
In Elton Johns Saturday Nights Alright For Fighting, I could understand why he’d be angry and want to fight on a Saturday night. He was sad because his best friend somehow shrunk down and drowned in the bottom of a glass of water.
I thought Olivia Newton John’s “Physical” was just about exercising. After all, the video showed people exercising.
This is the way I always heard the line.
I never thought there was any ambiguity about the fact that Lola was a tranny.
That’s one of mine too, but I thought it should have been:
I asked, “Something wrong?” Now I long for yesterday.
The song is about California itself, and the trappings associated with living the Hollywood lifestyle.