Although it has been said to be based on a "traditional piece known in the South",[1] it was very much a modern concoction, for the lyrics refer directly to women driving automobiles, a theme that was continued in later versions by almost all other artists.

His song includes "a catchy guitar lick, a stomping danceable groove and a neat structure which divided the twelve-bar [blues] stanza into verse and chorus: socking home a different coupler each time".

[6] McClennan, who had recently arrived in Chicago from the Delta, was cautioned by Big Bill Broonzy about using racially loaded lyrics in northern cities.

John Lee Hooker performed several adaptations of "Bottle Up and Go" throughout his career and recorded several versions of the song, usually varying the lyrics.

Biographer Charles Shaar Murray identified the song as "one of the templates on which a significant slice of Hooker's early repertoire is based".

Recordings in the 1940s (often with a variation on the title) include those by Blind Boy Fuller (as "Step It Up and Go") (1940),[12] and Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee (1942).

His interpretation has been described as being similar to Blind Boy Fuller's version,[14] although writer Brian Hinton believes "he probably knew it via the Everly Brothers".