The Matchbox Twenty song "3 AM" is about the difficult times lead singer Rob Thomas spent caring for his mother, who had cancer.
The drum sound on Buddy Knox's 1957 US #1 hit "Party Doll" was actually made by a cardboard box filled with cotton.
"Girl Crush" by Little Big Town came from the hashtag #girlcrush, which its co-writer, Lori McKenna, spotted on Instagram.
"Criminal" is Fiona Apple's only chart hit. Royalties from it allow her to make music on her terms, releasing albums several years apart.
Ricky Martin's "Livin' La Vida Loca" was the first #1 hit created entirely in Pro Tools.
Rod Stewart wrote "Maggie May" about the woman who deflowered him when he was 16.
Have you got the smarts to know which of these graduation song stories are real?
A talk with Martin Popoff about his latest book on Rush and how he assessed the thousands of albums he reviewed.
Phone booths are nearly extinct, but they provided storylines for some of the most profound songs of the pre-cell phone era.
Rob Halford, Richie Faulkner and Glenn Tipton talk twin guitar harmonies and explain how they create songs in Judas Priest.
Shears does very little promotion, which has kept him secluded from the spotlight. What changed when Cyndi Lauper had a hit with his song? Not much, really.
A drummer for one of the most successful metal bands of the last decade, Chris talks about what it's like writing and performing with Slipknot. Metal-neck is a factor.
