
Madonna wrote a song called "Love Won't Wait" that she didn't want, but became a UK #1 hit for Gary Barlow.

Kelly Clarkson's coronation song when she won American Idol in 2002 was "A Moment Like This," which was released as her first single and went to #1. Every finalist that season recorded the song in case they won.

Joni Mitchell's "Big Yellow Taxi" is about the commercialization of Hawaii. On her first trip to the islands, she looked out of her hotel window and saw a parking lot as far as the eye could see.

In the INXS song "Devil Inside," the devil represents chaos. "Every time you think something's right, he comes in and changes everything," Michael Hutchence said.

Bob Dylan's most popular song is "Like A Rolling Stone," which tells the story of a wealthy woman whose money and friends fall away. Dylan offers these mockingly encouraging words: "When you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose."
Tyler talks about his true love: songwriting. How he identifies the beauty in a melody and turns sorrow into art.
The man who created Yacht Rock with "Sailing" wrote one of his biggest hits while on acid.
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.
Chad tells tales from his time as drummer for Nirvana, and talks about his group Before Cars.
U2, Carly Simon, Joanna Newsom, Brian Wilson and Fiona Apple have all gone to Van Dyke Parks to make their songs exceptional.
Some songs get a second life when they find a new audience through a movie, commercial, TV show, or even the Internet.