drinking puns in song lyrics

June 14, 2014 1:38 PM

What are your favorite drinking-related puns in popular music?

Three examples from country songs would be "I've got all the proof I need", "I'll take the fifth" and "Parallel Bars". Obviously country has the longest tradition of this, but any genre is fair game.

posted by neat graffitist to Media & Arts (14 answers total)

Kenny Chesney - The Good Stuff
Gretchen Wilson - All Jacked Up
posted by pintapicasso at 2:11 PM on June 14, 2014

I drink alone by George Thorogood names all the drinks as people. Does that count?
posted by jozxyqk at 2:48 PM on June 14, 2014 [2 favorites]

From Elvis Costello's "Man Out of Time":

But for his private wife and kids somehow
Real life becomes a rumor
Days of dutch courage
Just three French letters and a German sense of humor

Explanations here.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 3:09 PM on June 14, 2014

"I'm at Home Getting Hammered (While She's Out Getting Nailed)," by the fictional band Banjo & Sullivan.
posted by Shmuel510 at 3:49 PM on June 14, 2014

Oh, and "307 Ale," by filker Tom Smith. (Earlier audio recording, plus lyrics. Several other recordings exist on that site, from various live shows.)
posted by Shmuel510 at 4:06 PM on June 14, 2014

Best answer: Garth Brooks throws those puns in whenever he can, particularly in the title of "American Honky-Tonk Bar Association", and a couple of puns about being high in "Friends in Low Places".
posted by Kakkerlak at 5:23 PM on June 14, 2014

Best answer: It's just the one line, but the English Beat's "I Confess" has the line "I've done too much of both types of w(h)ining."
posted by kimota at 5:25 PM on June 14, 2014

Best answer: Tequila by ALT and the Lost Civilization. Sample lyric: "Now here came Margarita and her friend Shirley Temple / I asked my friend bout Margarita / he said Shirley was a virgin and I wouldn't wanna meet her"

So this song isn't so much actually about the drinking, but it's built around the bar scene: Your Latest Trick by Dire Straits. Maybe more a music than a drinking pun, but it's one of my all time fave lines - "You played robbery with insolence, and I played the blues in 12 bars down on lovers lane".
posted by pianissimo at 5:37 PM on June 14, 2014

Best answer: There's this bluegrass band that plays at the Albatross in Berkeley CA, I forgot their name, but they have a song that goes on about "bar exams" and various other legal/drinking puns.
posted by divabat at 6:04 PM on June 14, 2014

"Wild Turkey"by Lacy J. Dalton

"Well I've been out with Johnny Red
George Dickel has warmed my soul
I've taken Southern Comfort
To my sweet Kentucky Beau
And on the cold nights Old Grandad
Has helped me make it through
But I'll be damned if I go home
With a wild turkey like you."
posted by zorseshoes at 6:16 PM on June 14, 2014

Seven Drunken Nights is a famous Irish folk song
posted by Flood at 7:05 PM on June 14, 2014

Best answer: Gal thinks Jim Beam is handsomer than lad, he isn't bad

Pour Decisions
posted by jeffamaphone at 11:16 PM on June 14, 2014

Jim (Beam), Jack (Daniels), and (Sweet Gypsy) Rose, by Johnny Bush.
posted by spitbull at 4:33 AM on June 15, 2014

Response by poster: Thanks guys -- "bar association" and "pour decisions" are the kind of thing I was looking for -- "dutch courage" or personifying Jack Daniels etc are a different kind of device. Appreciate all the responses though.
posted by neat graffitist at 5:42 AM on June 18, 2014