You wouldn't know it from the upbeat melody, but "Walkin' On The Sun" by Smash Mouth is about the 1992 Los Angeles Riots.
Boston leader Tom Scholz went back to his job at Polaroid after releasing the group's debut album. When his co-workers kept coming by to tell him "More Than A Feeling" was playing on the radio, he knew it was time to quit his day job.
"Killing An Arab" by The Cure was inspired by Albert Camus' book The Stranger.
The first use of the term "bro-country" in print was used to describe "Cruise," the breezy hit from Florida Georgia Line that checks the boxes of girls, trucks and back roads.
Phil Collins' "Take Me Home" is about a patient in a mental institution and was inspired by the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
Imagine Dragons lead singer Dan Reynolds says their 2012 hit "Radioactive" is "a song about having an awakening; kind of waking up one day and deciding to do something new, and see life in a fresh way."
Since emerging from MySpace with her hit "Bubbly," Colbie has become a top songwriter, even crafting a hit with Taylor Swift.
On the "schizoid element" of his lyrics, and a famous line from "Everything Zen."
The revered singer-songwriter talks inspiration and explains why she put a mahout in "Drop the Pilot."
Jon Fratelli talks about the band's third album, and the five-year break leading up to it.
P.F. was a teenager writing hits and playing on tracks for Jan & Dean when he wrote a #1 hit that got him blackballed.
Songwriters have used cards and card games to make sense of heartache, togetherness, and even Gonorrhea.