Ronnie Van Zant wrote the Lynyrd Skynyrd classic "Gimme Three Steps" after making the mistake of dancing with a girl whose boyfriend was in the bar and probably had a gun. He asked for a 3-step head start.
The Starland Vocal Band got the title "Afternoon Delight" from the late-afternoon appetizer menu at the restaurant Clyde's Of Georgetown in Washington, DC.
"Midnight Train To Georgia" was originally "Midnight Plane To Houston," but was changed to sound more R&B.
"Veronica" was inspired by Elvis Costello's grandmother, who suffered from Alzheimer's disease.
"Should I Stay or Should I Go?" by The Clash features some Spanish lines by the Texas singer Joe Ely.
A one-ton bell was custom made for AC/DC's "Hell's Bells." The recording was slowed to half speed to make it sound like a more ominous two-ton bell.
On Glen's résumé: hit songwriter, Facebook dominator, and member of Styx.
Oliver Leiber talks about writing and producing hits for Paula Abdul, and explains his complicated relationship with his father, the songwriter Jerry Leiber.
Newman makes it look easy these days, but in this 1974 interview, he reveals the paranoia and pressures that made him yearn for his old 9-5 job.
Some songs get a second life when they find a new audience through a movie, commercial, TV show, or even the Internet.
The former Dead Kennedys frontman on the past, present and future of the band, what music makes us "pliant and stupid," and what he learned from Alice Cooper.
Dokken frontman Don Dokken explains what broke up the band at the height of their success in the late '80s, and talks about the botched surgery that paralyzed his right arm.