Tom Cochrane wrote "Life Is A Highway" to pull himself out of a funk following an exhausting humanitarian trip to Africa.
The actress Michelle Pfeiffer gets namechecked in the 2014 megahit "Uptown Funk" ("Michelle Pfeiffer, that white gold"). When it was released, "Riptide" by Vance Joy was on the charts; that song also mentions her ("Closest thing to Michelle Pfeiffer that you've ever seen").
The line, "Gotta keep 'em separated" in "Come Out And Play" by The Offspring came to lead singer Dexter Holland when he was a medical student and needed to keep bacteria samples away from each other.
Alicia Keys wrote "If I Ain't Got You" just after she'd heard the news that Aaliyah had died in a plane crash.
In "I Walk The Line," Johnny Cash hums before each verse. He did this to get his pitch, as the song changes key several times.
"Bittersweet Symphony" by The Verve samples an obscure orchestral arrangement of the 1965 Rolling Stones song "The Last Time." The Verve had to sign away most of the royalties before they could release the song.
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.
Director Mark Pellington on Pearl Jam's "Jeremy," and music videos he made for U2, Jon Bon Jovi and Imagine Dragons.
"Lullaby" singer Shawn Mullins on "Beautiful Wreck," beating the Devil, and his writing credit on the Zac Brown Band song "Toes."
Wilder's hit "Break My Stride" had an unlikely inspiration: a famous record mogul who rejected it.
Our chat with Barney Hoskyns, who covers the wild years of Woodstock - the town, not the festival - in his book Small Town Talk.
With the band in danger of being dropped from their label, Alice Cooper drummer Neal Smith co-wrote the song that started their trek from horror show curiosity to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.