When a rock song from the '70s kicks off with a cowbell, you know you're in for a good time. Case in point: Nazareth's 1975 classic, "Hair of the Dog." One of the Scottish band's biggest hits (along with "Love Hurts"), "Hair of the Dog" definitely made an impression on listeners, including many who would go on to become rockers themselves. The song made a huge resurgence during the hair metal era, when bands including Warrant, Britny Fox and Guns N' Roses covered the track (Axl Rose was such a huge fan of the band, he reportedly asked them to perform at his wedding). But none of those versions can hold a candle to the original...which, as it turns out, almost had a very different title.
As bassist Pete Agnew told Classic Rock in 2009, "Hair of the Dog" was originally supposed to be called "Son of a Bitch." This makes sense, of course, given the epic chorus ("Now you're messing with a son of a bitch!"). Alas, the powers-that-be decided that wasn't going to fly.
“The record company flipped when we told them our intended title,” Agnew recalled. “We argued that it was okay because John Wayne used the same phrase all the time, but they wouldn't buy it.”
First, "Son of a Bitch" evolved into "Heir of the Dog," which then became "Hair of the Dog" (inspired, of course, by the traditional hangover cure).
“It had absolutely no meaning at all!” Agnew admitted with a laugh. “And nothing to do with the content of the song!”
Indeed. "Hair of the Dog" isn't about how to rebound from a night of drinking. It's more about how to rebound from a toxic love affair:
Heartbreaker, soul shakerI've been told about youSteamroller, midnight shoulderWhat they been sayin' must be true
Red hot mama, velvet charmerTime's come to pay your dues
According to Agnew, the chorus came about as a sort of surprise from vocalist Dan McCafferty. The song was mostly composed in rehearsals, he explained.
“It was based on a riff that Manny [Charlton, guitarist] had been messing around with,”he said. “Everyone else joined in and mucked around with it, adding the stops and starts.”
When the time came to record the vocals, McCafferty simply smiled and told his bandmates he "had something up his sleeve."
“When we heard Dan singing the chorus we all thought: ‘This should do well,'" Agnew quipped, adding, "Such language is nothing to the stuff you hear on records these days, but back then it was considered outrageously risqué.”
Watal Asanuma/Shinko Music / Getty Images
Risqué or not, "Hair of the Dog" was, obviously, a big success: It peaked at #17 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became a live concert highlight...although it did stir up some trouble in one country.
“We were playing two nights in Chile back when [military dictator] General Pinochet was still in power," Agnew said. "It was a televised thing that went out to about 100 million people. On the first night, we finished as usual to 'Hair of the Dog' and Dan got the audience to sing the chorus back at him. It created such a furor that it made the next day’s newspapers."
“Before the second show the Lady Mayoress came backstage with an entourage and gave us an attitude. Somebody translated what she had said and it was: ‘Tonight you will not finish with that song. Do you understand?’" he continued.
McCafferty's reaction was pure rock and roll rebellion.
“Dan kept nodding away and told her: ‘Aye, no problem.’ When she left the room I asked him: ‘What the hell are you talking about?'" Agnew remembered, adding, "And he replied: ‘We’re not gonna close the show with that song. We’re gonna open with it.’”
It's safe to say Guns N' Roses didn't have to deal with any of that by the time they covered "Hair of the Dog" almost two decades later. As for Agnew, he seemed less than impressed with the band's cover, released on The Spaghetti Incident? album.
“Their version was a bit of a copycat thing; they didn’t try to make it their own,” Agnew said. “We always try to add our own personality to our covers, but that was never the point with them — Axl had always wanted to sing 'Son Of A Bitch.' He wanted to sound like Dan.”
Well, you can't blame Axl for that.
Related: 1968 Party Anthem, Banned From High School Dances Across America, Topped the Charts Twice in 20 Years
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