Tube Snake Boogie by ZZ Top

Album: El Loco (1981)

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Songfacts®:

What is a Tube Snake? Billy Gibbons answered that question in a 1985 interview with Spin magazine: "Originally, it was a surfboard. A friend of mine, for obvious reasons, liked the sound of the name. I guess it's the first cousin to a tube steak."

Comments: 8

Owen from Arlington Heights, IllinoisYou had me at “She won’t do it but her sister will”.
Greg from America ZZ Top claims the “tube snake” is a surfboard in its liner notes. But we all know it’s a man’s penis. After all, how many people surf “all night long”?
Jack from The State Of BewildermentTiff, don't you be so naive. Lots of ZZ Top music has lyrics about sex or with innuendo. Pearl Necklace is a particularly raunchy example. La Grange is about a whorehouse. Mexican Blackbird is about a Mexican whore (everyone calls her puta, cause no one really knows her name), Bedroom Thang is about an underage runaway. In the verse he wants her to leave him alone, but in the chorus it's a different story.. She loves my Automobile. Etc Songs like Tush and Tube Snake Boogie may not literally mean anything naughty, but I wouldn't be surprised if they wrote them with a sort of double entendre in mind (and if you read the quote from Billy Gibbons here on Songfacts, he said that Tube Snake originally meant a surfboard, that a friend liked the sound of the name "for obvious reasons," and that it's a first cousin of Tube Steak. So Billy himself saw the connection). No one told them to do these songs because "sex sells," and I seriously doubt anyone could have made them do something they didn't want to do. These guys are Texans, and in my experience Texans aren't so easily pushed around.
Jadk from The State Of BewildermentYeah, guys, I'm sure they knew what a tube steak is (I've known it since I was a child, before that album came out). But the song is Tube SNAKE Boogie, not Tube Steak Boogie.
Tiff from Michigan If you EVER heard the explanation of the band and WHAT they wrote about it was ACTUALLY writing about SURFING/BOOGIE BOARDING. Don’t be so naive! ZZTop had all the hot chicks etc bc some video production ‘expert’ said “sex sells” and had the videos made that way. NOT THE BAND!
Seventhmist from 7th HeavenQuite right, George. Considering what ZZ usually sang about, that's the only conclusion to draw.
George from Vancouver, CanadaConsidering other lyrics, I think they knew tube steak is a slang term for a penis, sexually speaking. It's also a slang term for a frankfurter (also used sexually often)
Cyberpope from Richmond, Canada&, of course, a tube steak is a man's erection -- just one more of the many sexual central themes in ZZ Top songs!

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