Christian Kane, ‘The House Rules’ — Story Behind the Lyrics

Christian Kane's debut single and album title track 'The House Rules' can apply to any bar in small town America, but the song's inspiration came from Sunset Strip. Christian, part-time actor -- he can be seen as 'Eliot Spencer' on TNT's 'Leverage' -- and full-time singer-songwriter, partnered with Blair Daly, who Christian describes as one of his "dearest friends," to write the tune. Christian tells The Boot about how 'The House Rules' were actually developed.

'The House Rules' originally started with me and Blair, because my band played Los Angeles' Viper Room for four years. We opened for Shooter Jennings. We went on in between hair bands; we were the only country band in Los Angeles at the time. I'm not saying we were the only country band on the Sunset Strip: we were the only country band in Los Angeles.

It was tough. You do a ballad, you lose the crowd. That's how we learned how to rock so much. We had to keep rocking, otherwise people get loud and they grab a drink. 'The House Rules' was originally about, "Listen, shut the f--- up, this is my house for an hour and we're going to play country music." The fact is, there's about three or four rows deep of cowboys that if you come in here get loud and start banging your head or whatever you want to do, they're going to whoop your a--, so these are the house rules.

That was the originally idea. Then it became more of a song about my dad and the blue collar worker. It's a song about washing the week away. You go to work and get the crap kicked out of you. When the weekend comes, come hang out with us. We know your name, this your place, these are all your friends. Come drink, come hang out, come wash the week away: everyone's welcome. But, if you're a new comer, be very careful.

There really only is one house rule, and that's just have fun. But if you get out of line, there's the exit.