Beyonce Knowles and Michelle Williams wrote the Destiny's Child song "Girl" for Kelly Rowland as an encouragement for her to end her relationship with a verbally and physically abusive boyfriend.
"Killing An Arab" by The Cure was inspired by Albert Camus' book The Stranger.
Bob Seger's "Against The Wind" has the famous mind-bending line, "Wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then." Seger was going to cut it, but his Eagles buddies Glenn Frey and Don Henley told him it was the best line in the song.
"Dark Fantasy" by Kanye West opens with a reinterpretation of Cinderella as read by Nicki Minaj.
"Master Blaster (Jammin')" is Stevie Wonder's tribute to Bob Marley, released less than a year before Marley died.
"Heart of Glass" was Blondie's first foray into disco, which turned off some fans. Debbie Harry said they did it because they "wanted to be uncool."
The Doobies guitarist and lead singer, Tom wrote the classics "Listen To The Music," "Long Train Runnin'" and "China Grove."
Chad tells tales from his time as drummer for Nirvana, and talks about his group Before Cars.
Jim talks about the impact of "The Middle" and uses a tree metaphor to describe his songwriting philosophy.
David talks about videos he made for Prince, Alabama, Big & Rich, Sheryl Crow, DMB, Melissa Etheridge and Sisters of Mercy.
It started with a bouncy MTV classic. Nirvana and MCR made them scary, then Gwen, Avril and Madonna put on the pom poms.
The former Metallica bassist talks about his first time writing a song with James Hetfield, and how a hand-me-down iPad has changed his songwriting.