"Keep Your Hands to Yourself" is the debut single by American

Southern rock Southern rock is a subgenre of rock music and a genre of Americana. It developed in the Southern United States from rock and roll, country music, and blues and is focused generally on electric guitars and vocals. Author Scott B. Bomar speculat ...

group

the Georgia Satellites The Georgia Satellites are an American Southern rock band from Atlanta, Georgia. They achieved mainstream success with their 1986 self-titled debut album, featuring their best-known single " Keep Your Hands to Yourself", which peaked at No. 2 o ...

. The song was written by the band's lead singer,

Dan Baird Daniel John Baird (born December 12, 1953) is an American singer-songwriter, musician and producer. He is best known as the lead singer and rhythm guitarist from the 1980s rock band The Georgia Satellites. Baird formed The Georgia Satellites in 19 ...

, and was released in November 1986. The single reached number 2 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 during the week of February 21, 1987.

Content

The song is a

twelve-bar blues The 12-bar blues (or blues changes) is one of the most prominent chord progressions in popular music. The blues progression has a distinctive form in lyrics, phrase, chord structure, and duration. In its basic form, it is predominantly based on ...

in the key of

A major A major (or the key of A) is a major scale based on A, with the pitches A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. Its key signature has three sharps. Its relative minor is F-sharp minor and its parallel minor is A minor. The key of A major is the only k ...

with a moderate tempo of about 112

beats per minute Beat, beats or beating may refer to: Common uses * Patrol, or beat, a group of personnel assigned to monitor a specific area ** Beat (police), the territory that a police officer patrols ** Gay beat, an area frequented by gay men * Battery ( ...

. It follows the chord pattern A-D-A-E-A, with vocals ranging from D4 to A5. The lyrics tell the story of a woman who refuses to become more intimate with her boyfriend until he marries her. Baird said the song "basically wrote itself" on a bus ride home from his construction job.

Critical reception

Stephen Thomas Erlewine Stephen Thomas Erlewine (; born June 18, 1973) is an American music critic and senior editor for the online music database AllMusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for AllMusic, as well as a freelance writer, occ ...

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

wrote that the song "rocked as hard as an old

Chuck Berry Charles Edward Anderson Berry (October 18, 1926 – March 18, 2017) was an American singer, songwriter and guitarist who pioneered rock and roll. Nicknamed the " Father of Rock and Roll", he refined and developed rhythm and blues into th ...

song, as well as being almost as clever." In the book ''99 Red Balloons: And 100 All-Time One-Hit Wonders'', Brent Mann wrote that "it's just a timeless, kick-out-the-jams rock 'n' roll number. Dan Baird digs into the song's vocals with a no-holds-barred zest straight out of a Texas honky-tonk."

Music video

The video for the single begins with the band riding on a flatbed cruising down a highway, along with flashbacks of Dan Baird and his fiancee preparing for their wedding. These scenes continue, until just before the last verse, where they arrive at the wedding, and are greeted by the guests. The band continue to play on the now-parked flatbed. During the instrumental outro, Baird is stripped of his guitar, and carried by two men over to the bride as the wedding cake comes out and is placed on the table. As Baird (now dressed in a tuxedo) kisses his new bride (after being forced by her

shotgun A shotgun (also known as a scattergun, or historically as a fowling piece) is a long gun, long-barreled firearm designed to shoot a straight-walled cartridge (firearms), cartridge known as a shotshell, which usually discharges numerous small p ...

-carrying father), it is finally revealed that the bride is quite heavily pregnant. In an overhead shot, the same flatbed, now with tin cans tied to it and "just married" painted on the bed of it, is seen cruising down the highway.

Chart performance

References

{{authority control 1986 songs 1986 debut singles Elektra Records singles The Georgia Satellites songs Sawyer Brown songs Hank Williams Jr. songs John Anderson (musician) songs Song recordings produced by Jeff Glixman Songs written by Dan Baird Songs about marriage