How I Wrote...

Pat Travers spills out the tale behind his classic 1980 cut.

- JOE BOSSO

SOME MUSICIANS HAVE a love/hate relationship with their hit songs. Not so for guitarist Pat Travers and his 1980 flamethrower blues-rock smash, "Snortin' Whiskey." "I'm totally good with it," he says. "It's a really cool and solid rock song. It's not supposed to be profound. In fact, its silliness is one of the great things about it.

"Plus, it's got a killer opening riff. The second I start playing it, I get an immediate response. What's not to like about that?"

BAD BEHAVIOR

That riff is one Travers had been toying with a few years before he wrote "Snortin' Whiskey." A friend had shown the guitarist a country lick, and over time he added a blues-rock flavor to it. Several years later, in 1979, Travers and his rhythm section - bassist Peter "Mars" Cowling and drummer Tommy Aldridge - were in a Miami rehearsal studio working on material for his fifth studio album, Crash and Burn. Hours went by as the band waited for their second guitarist, Pat Thrall, to show. "We jammed on a number of things, including that riff," Travers recalls.