Kid Rock performed his song "Amen" at Barack Obama's inaugural, but claims he didn't vote for him.
Pink Floyd's "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" is about their founding member Syd Barrett, who became an acid casualty. Notice the S-Y-D in the title.
The Split Enz song "Six Months In A Leaky Boat" is about the journey explorers made from Europe to colonize Australia and New Zealand, where the band is from.
The Four Tops' "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)" was written by the Motown team of Lamont Dozier, Brian Holland and Eddie Holland. The phrase "Sugar pie, honey bunch" was something Dozier's grandfather used to say when he was a kid.
Steely Dan's engineer, Roger Nichols, built one of the first drum machines, which they used on "Hey Nineteen."
Ronnie Spector nailed the vocal for The Ronettes song "(Walking) In the Rain" on the first take -- unheard of in the perfectionist producer Phil Spector's world.
"Mony Mony." "Crimson and Clover." "Draggin' The Line." The hits kept coming for Tommy James, and in a plot line fit for a movie, his record company was controlled by the mafia.
Songs that seem to glorify violence against women are often misinterpreted - but not always.
The renown Texas songwriter has been at it for 40 years, with tales to tell about The Flatlanders and The Clash - that's Joe's Tex-Mex on "Should I Stay or Should I Go?"
Our chat with Barney Hoskyns, who covers the wild years of Woodstock - the town, not the festival - in his book Small Town Talk.
Who writes a song about a name they found in a phone book? That's just one of the everyday things these guys find to sing about. Anything in their field of vision or general scope of knowledge is fair game. If you cross paths with them, so are you.
With $50 and a glue stick, Bruce Pavitt created Sub Pop, a fanzine-turned-label that gave the world Nirvana and grunge. He explains how motivated individuals can shift culture.
