Kung Fu was big in 1974, with movies by Bruce Lee and a TV series called Kung Fu. Carl Douglas brought it to the dance floor that year with "Kung Fu Fighting," a #1 hit.
The eerie percussion and guitar for Portsihead's "Sour Times" was sampled from Lalo Schifrin's "Danube Incident," music composed by the Argentine composer for an episode of Mission Impossible.
Don McLean's "American Pie" starts in mono and gradually goes to stereo. It isn't full stereo until the end of the song, which is over 8 minutes long.
"Back In The U.S.S.R." by The Beatles was play on "California Girls" by The Beach Boys, with "Moscow girls" and "Ukraine girls" instead of the all-American girls.
"One Way Or Another" is based on a stalker who creeped out Blondie lead singer Debbie Harry.
When Tony Bennett and Amy Winehouse's version of "Body and Soul" made the Hot 100 in 2011, Bennett became, at age 85, the oldest living artist to make that chart.
They sang about pink torpedoes and rocking you tonight tonight, but some real lyrics are just as ridiculous. See if you can tell which lyrics are real and which are Spinal Tap in this lyrics quiz.
Pool balls, magpies and thorns without roses - how well do you know your Tom Waits lyrics?
Cain talks about the divine inspirations for "Don't Stop Believin'" and "Faithfully."
How Bing Crosby, Les Paul, a US Army Signal Corps Officer, and the Nazis helped shape rock and Roll.
Devo founders Mark Mothersbaugh and Jerry Casale take us into their world of subversive performance art. They may be right about the De-Evoloution thing.
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.