To the start I’ll attempt to quote a few lines from John Steinbecks opening paragraphs of his book ‘Cannery Row’.
“Its inhabitants are, as the man once said, ‘whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches’, by which he meant Everybody.”
“Had the man looked through another peephole, he might have said, ‘Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men,’ and he would have meant the same thing.”
Lyrics are the essence of emotion; they’re thoughts and feelings that someone has condensed into the tightest set of words that can convey the peculiarity and presence of whom or where they are; the words above are an acknowledgement that anyone may see the same thing and draw different conclusions- and so with what they read.
Just like the formulas that scientists and engineers use, poems can be the most elegant and concise way to describe how we feel. Modern (in the age of popular music, stretching from the early 1900’s till now..) poets have combined their talents, and sometimes are, the musicians that bring our desires, sorrows, joys, heartbreak and wonder to life. Seemingly innocuous or frivolous songs have meaning far beyond the strains of the melody that echoes in the popular recollection. Take ZZ Top’s “Rough Boy” for example. A simple search by the almighty Google reveals the lyric, and which album the song came from; a lot of praise for the great music video, but nothing around what the lyrics mean. So here’s my take- first of all the lyrics:
(you can see the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1qkUZZ1aho)
What in the world’s come all over me?
I ain’t got a chance of one in three.
Ain’t got no rap, ain’t got no line
but if you’ll give me just a minute I’ll be feelin’ fine.
I am the one who can fade the heat,
the one they all say just can’t be beat.
I’ll shoot it to you straight and look you in the eye.
So gimme just a minute and I’ll tell you why
I’m a rough boy, I’m a rough boy.
I don’t care how you look at me
because I’m the one and you will see
we can make it work, we can make it by.
So give me one more minute and I’ll tell you why
I’m a rough boy, I’m a rough boy.
As an aside, microsoft sucks, pretty much just like mac as far as I am concerned; I have just downloaded this song and I cannot find it anywhere; windows 7 has hidden it from me; I am reasonably PC lucid but the new state of things tends to the mac version- show the user only what the programmer things you should see; which is exactly what led to the crash of an Aerobus aircraft a few years ago (the pilot didn’t need to know HOW it worked, because the programmers knew better, apparently- which ended up in a spectacular crash when the pilots and programmers ideas didn’t agree…); dumb it down so that the most basic of users will not be able to get in and mess it up- except that the intermediate users now have to have super skills to get what should be quite basic to the PC literate. And that is why I dislike mac intensely- it caters to the LCD; the lowest common denominator, much like religions; dumb them down and then, once you have removed the tools of reason, curiosity and other manners of expression, then tell them how you, the corporation would like them to think.
Its like buying a beer that is packed into a plastic packet for you to take home. At home you’d take it out (but not before your hand dicked around a few imaginary packets first, and then, in frustration, you burnt all the packets and the beer eventually dropped out) and now you try to open it. Yeah, now you’re really pissed off, because they’ve hidden the opening somewhere abnormal, like on your left arm, after you grab the beer. Before you grab it, it looks perfectly normal, but when you reach out they change it all and hide everything elsewhere, because now you are a ‘user’ and theirs, so its all according to their reasoning. After a struggle you have the beer in your hand AND you’ve found the opening- but try to open it; its been cemented shut and won’t be opened until you’ve passed all the tests; is it your beer, where did you get it; what’s the secret word to get it open, does the seller know who you are; what is the password that they have given you to open it, what’s the beers serial number, what’s the number tattooed on your wrist, who’s your daddy, and so on…
Fuggit, give up, you break the bottle over a bowl and extract the contents- ms goes ‘waily, waily, waily, why don’t they like us….”
Back to the song, and just looking at the lyrics, the first paragraph is all about a guy trying to charm a girl, feeling daunted and scared “what in the world’s come over me- I ain’t got a chance of one in three…”
He’s got no clever line to win her over, no sure way,
“Ain’t got no rap, ain’t got no line”
But he’s asking for a chance to state his case; isn’t that what we are all trying to do, male and female? We’d like to know that someone would like to know us beyond the personality that we immediately project, to the place whom we feel that we really are.
The next paragraph is about who the person might really be, and idea of who they think they are, the one who ‘can fade the heat’; make it all ok. Or the person who ‘just can’t be beat’- someone who see’s themselves as on top, maybe arrogant, but we’re talking song fantasy here- poetry, imagination and desire. And its couched in the terms of an observation “I’m the one they SAY….” , a opposed to “I’m the one that…”
But he say’s to give him time, give him a minute and he’ll explain why- why he’s that ‘rough boy’
Look at the video and see what it is that is too rough about the visuals around the song- its classic boy desire; to be a hero, sexy girls and the same kind of cars- it’s not rough at all really. There is a beautiful theme of cut-offs; the band and their desire depicted as just parts; isolating those parts to attract you to the essence of just those parts- the sexy legs, the active hands, the skilful fingers that play the instruments and one that holds the girl back but lets her go- a passing tribute; a respectful but attracted nod to an attraction- and an attraction that is not unacknowledged by the bands videos; desire and admiration for the opposite sex, but coupled with a great respect, admiration and awe.
I’ll shoot it to you straight and look you in the eye.
So gimme just a minute and I’ll tell you why
I’m a rough boy, I’m a rough boy
There is a straight, secret and hopeful message in there; he’ll look her in the eye and tell it to her straight- give him some time and he’ll tell why…
The idea of a rough boy is a warning because he’s not really sure of himself, but feels a warning is appropriate. “There’s something there, as you’ve guessed (I’m a rough boy), but I’ m a decent guy (I think), but I/ and he in the song don’t know how to show it all; gimme some time… (and I’ll show it all…)” –that’s my take..
The video may seem sexist to some- a cut off the great legs of a girl- but is also the cut-off of the band, showing the persona that the public sees them; the bearded faces and dusty sunglasses; nothing gets let in- and in the same way the video shows just those parts that you might want to associate with whom they are. They may not be any more sexist (but likely they are 🙂 ) than the video portrays, but there is also good chance that there is more to it than that- see their video around ‘Sleeping bag’ and you’ll get an idea of what I mean.
In ‘Rough Boy’ there is the embodiment of a cleaned car, one that is sleek and beautiful, dreamy and powerful, and theres is half woman who holds the attention of the band; who themselves are half embodied- the showing of the essences relevant to the song – and a car that has come to be washed and re-fulfilled in outer space.
There is an element of change highlighted by the last verse, a spiritual, and washing of the bands main symbol (found 0n the car), vizualising ‘coming clean’ to be able to ‘look you straight in the eye’.
I’ll shoot it to you straight and look you in the eye.
leading on to:
I don’t care how you look at me
because I’m the one and you will see
we can make it work, we can make it by.
So give me one more minute and I’ll tell you why
I’m a rough boy, I’m a rough boy.
Its all change, just give a chance to see that change; he’s her one who can make it work; and it can work. Although the change is depicted in the metaphoric ‘minute’ he’s essentially still a rough boy, but he wants not to be that rough boy- and she’s always the one who’s really seen him, and perhaps the only one who can see who he really is.
The analogy is around cleansing and time; change waits its cue in the wings. Its written in the script, but time must run its course before the lines come to life.
Posted by Jay Harrison-Hyde, esquire 😉
Rawhyde's Blog- a subsection of HorribleHyde 
You’re quite thorough. What a valiant attempt at explaining the lyrics, because you’re right – it’s not really out there on the web. But I do have to mention. I saw on songfacts.com the following excerpt:
“In a 1985 interview with Spin magazine, Billy Gibbons explained: “He’s this fictitious character who was the only way that ZZ Top was going to get to play another ballad. The way he came up was, ‘How would a ZZ Top fan allow such a beautiful, lush bed of sound into their realm?’ The pretty music had to have a rough boy in it. He’s there. On El Loco we did ‘Leila’ which is ZZ Top-meets-the-Beach Boys. I don’t think it worked as well as, say, a synth programmer meeting a rap guy in an alley in New York. The only thing is, how long is it going to be before somebody says, ‘Hey, man! You the rough boy?’ How are you going to answer that?”
Apparently, it’s a synth programmer who meets a rapper in an alley in New York and convinces him to give him a shot in the industry, and convinces him that he’s rough like them. That would explain his low chances less than “one in three ” (an ode to the typically low odds of making it in the industry), why he ain’t got a “rap” or “line” (he’s not a rapper). And Gibbons doesn’t say anything about a female in it, although all I’ve ever thought was that it was about him getting with some hot chick… But, just throwing that out there. I applaud your fulfilling interpretation… I don’t think you left a single possible thought or angle out, and you deserve kudos for that, because I damn sure haven’t seen an interpretation as thorough as yours. So thanks man.