The eerie percussion and guitar for Portsihead's "Sour Times" was sampled from Lalo Schifrin's "Danube Incident," music composed by the Argentine composer for an episode of Mission Impossible.
Pat Benatar's "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" was written by a guy named Eddie after going through a weird therapy session where he punched pillows to get out his aggressions.
An Allen Ginsberg line from his poem Howl inspired "Machinehead" by Bush: "Machine says I saw the best minds of my generation."
The Simpsons theme song was composed by Danny Elfman, who went on to write music for films like Edward Scissorhands and Men In Black. He had a band at the time called Oingo Boingo, which did the theme song to the 1985 movie Weird Science.
The Arctic Monkeys 2011 song "Suck It and See" is titled after a British saying meaning you should try something to see if you like it.
"Forever" by Chris Brown was written for a Wrigley's Doublemint Gum commercial. The full song contains the gum's tagline: "Double your pleasure, double your fun."
We've heard of artists putting their hearts into their music, but some take it literally.
The head of Drake's estate shares his insights on the late folk singer's life and music.
When he was asked to write a song for the Singles soundtrack, Mark thought the Seattle grunge scene was already overblown, so that's what he wrote about.
The stories behind the biggest hit songs about trucking.
Psychedelic Furs lead singer Richard Butler talks about their first album since 1991 and explains what's really going on in "Pretty In Pink."
Dan cracked the Top 40 with "Ritual," then went to India and spent 2 hours with the Dalai Lama.