This was written by Brownsville Station guitarist Michael "Cub" Koda. Koda wrote for various music magazines, including Goldmine, until he died in 2000.
This song is about a group of schoolboys who sneak out of class to smoke tobacco in the boy's bathroom, only to be found by the principal who reminds them "No smoking allowed in school." Cub Koda got the idea for the song from memories of hanging out at a movie theater with his childhood friends. They would smuggle cigarettes into the men's room at the Clinton Theater in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Koda moved the scene from the movie house to the schoolhouse later.
For school outcasts who often questioned authority, this was a very validating song. It became an anthem for frustrated youth who felt marginalized at school.
It took Koda a half hour to write the song and an hour for the band to record it.
Producer Doug Morris (also the owner of Big Tree Records) hated the song - he refused to release it as a 45 until a Portland, Maine, FM station started to play it off an LP. Afterwards, requests for the song streamed into the record company - it had over 100,000 orders for the single before Morris changed his mind and released it.
Motley Crue covered this in 1985 on their album Theatre of Pain. It was their first US Top 40, hitting #16.
This was included on the 2002 compilation CD Mullets Rock!, an album celebrating one of the most embarrassing hairstyles of all time and bands that wore them.
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