How the Song Came to Be

Elton John’s ‘Levon’: A Pauper to a Pawn

The first single from 1971’s Madman Across the Water is “one of our finest moments lyrically and melodically” and includes Paul Buckmaster’s soaring orchestral arrangements.

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First Banger: The Shredding Delight of the Beatles’ ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’

This is the first Beatles guitar solo that shreds, and it’s hard to fathom/estimate how many kids decided they wanted to be guitar heroes upon hearing Harrison’s thrilling break.

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The Jaggerz’ ‘The Rapper’: You Know What He’s After

“The song was something that I wrote watching people in nightclubs. You’d see these dudes go over and start rapping to chicks,” said the band’s Donnie Iris.

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The Ides of March and the Story of ‘Vehicle’

They took their band name from a Shakespeare classic, their biggest hit from a real-life incident, and they drove their way up the charts in the year 1970.

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Johnny Cash—’A Boy Named Sue’: Behind the Song

“That’s the most cleverly written song I’ve ever heard,” Cash told the song’s composer. It became Cash’s biggest hit single.

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‘Dancing in the Moonlight’—The Circuitous Path of the One and Only King Harvest Hit

Everybody was “Dancing in the Moonlight” in the early ’70s, but who was the band that recorded this catchy one-hit wonder? We decided to find out.

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‘Dueling Banjos’ From ‘Deliverance’: An Unlikely Hit

The song, featured prominently in the 1972 thriller, was used without the permission of its composer. There’s actually only one banjo used

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Bon Jovi’s Game-Changing ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’

Guess who didn’t much care for the song that made the band a major force of rock for decades to come? And who’s just fine with it now…

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Zager & Evans’ ‘In the Year 2525’: The Gloomiest #1?

It was, to be sure, one of the bleakest songs ever to hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. And then Zager and Evans never charted again.

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When Liberace Was “Feelin’ Groovy”

The famed entertainer performed it on national television in 1968. Our look back at the song’s history. (Its composer, Paul Simon, hates it.)

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