ABBA's Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson conceived "Dancing Queen" as a dance song with the working title "Boogaloo," drawing inspiration from the 1974 George McCrae disco hit "Rock Your Baby." Their manager Stig Anderson came up with the title "Dancing Queen."
Salt's "mighty good man" in the Salt-N-Pepa "Whatta Man" video is played by Tupac Shakur.
In the UK, Michael Jackson's "Thriller" returns to the chart every Halloween, a tradition started in 2007.
"Ain't No Sunshine" by Bill Withers was inspired by the Jack Lemmon movie Days of Wine and Roses.
"Nobody Does It Better" by Carly Simon was used in the film The Spy Who Loved Me. It was the first James Bond song not named after the movie.
Mike Nesmith wrote Linda Ronstadt's first hit, "Different Drum," before he joined The Monkees. He played an intentionally bad version of it on the show.
Starting in Virginia City, Nevada and rippling out to the Haight-Ashbury, LSD reshaped popular music.
The singer/bassist for Concrete Blonde talks about how her songs come from clairvoyance, and takes us through the making of their hit "Joey."
U2, Carly Simon, Joanna Newsom, Brian Wilson and Fiona Apple have all gone to Van Dyke Parks to make their songs exceptional.
Michael tells the story of "Send Me On My Way," and explains why some of the words in the song don't have a literal meaning.
A renowned guitarist and rock revivalist, Dave took "I Hear You Knocking" to the top of the UK charts and was the first to record Elvis Costello's "Girls Talk."
Dan cracked the Top 40 with "Ritual," then went to India and spent 2 hours with the Dalai Lama.
