Southern rock superstars Lynyrd Skynyrd embraced gothic noir for “Saturday Night Special,” their lurid and unflinchingly direct critique of gun violence in America.
Read MoreLynyrd Skynyrd aims its ‘Saturday Night Special’ at gun violence
How Gladys Knight and the Pips ‘Heard It Through the Grapevine’ before Marvin Gaye
Gladys Knight and the Pips’ “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” was at one time the best-selling single in Motown Records history — and then Marvin Gaye’s version of the song came along just 13 months later, and knocked it off its pedestal. But Knight’s “Grapevine” is no footnote: her rendition of the Norman Whitfield/Barrett Strong classic continues to gain admirers more than half a century after its original release, buoyed by an incendiary 1969 live performance featured in Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s Oscar-winning documentary Summer of Soul.
Read More‘In Too Deep’ sugarcoats Sum 41’s pop-punk
Sum 41 is synonymous with scabby late-Nineties pop-punk, but its music skews decidedly pop on “In Too Deep.” Though it originally failed to match the chart success of its predecessor, “Fat Lip,” “In Too Deep” has since proven to be the band’s most enduring song, a blissful mixture of Beatlesque vocal harmonies and chunky power chords that helped turn the Canadian four-piece into superstars across North America.
Read More‘Reunited’ brings Peaches & Herb together again for the first time
There’s only one “Reunited.” Peaches & Herb’s gauzy, gooey ballad is pure polyester pop, a disco-era kitsch classic endlessly repurposed and recontextualized across a dizzying array of sitcoms, advertisements and memes. There’s a whole lot of Peaches, however. While Herb Fame has remained a constant in the R&B duo since its 1966 introduction, no fewer than seven different women have assumed the role of Peaches over the decades, most famously Linda Greene, whose vocals are featured on “Reunited” as well as the team’s other Me Decade smash, “Shake Your Groove Thing.”
Read MoreNelly Furtado soars on the success of ‘I’m Like a Bird’
Nelly Furtado ascended into the popular consciousness with the soulful folk-pop anthem “I’m Like a Bird,” winner of the 2001 Juno Award for Single of the Year in the singer’s native Canada as well as a chart smash in the U.S. and overseas.
Read MoreCamper Van Beethoven ushers in the alternative era with ‘Pictures of Matchstick Men’
“Pictures of Matchstick Men” by Camper Van Beethoven was not the biggest modern rock hit of 1989, but it was one of the most significant. College rock was becoming something else as the decade drew to a close: it would be two years before it was clear what that new thing was, when Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” knocked Michael Jackson off the charts and everyone started wearing flannel shirts. But 1989 signals the pivotal moment when the relatively cozy, intimate world of college radio began morphing into the louder, flashier world of alternative rock, and while one could pick any number of that year’s landmark releases to signify this change — Nirvana’s first album Bleach, the Pixies’ Doolittle, Mother’s Milk by the Red Hot Chili Peppers — Key Lime Pie, Camper Van Beethoven’s final studio LP before a decade-plus hiatus, merits strong consideration.
Read More‘Twenty-Five Miles’ later, Edwin Starr lives up to his billing
Edwin Starr will forever remain synonymous with “War,” his 1970 psychedelic soul milestone assailing America’s ongoing involvement in the decades-long conflict in Vietnam. But Starr was by no means a one-hit wonder. Eighteen months before declaring “War” on the pop charts, the singer hit paydirt with “Twenty-Five Miles,” one of the most propulsive singles ever released under the Motown Records aegis.
Read MoreRomance rumors fan the flames of Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello’s ‘Señorita’
Rising pop superstars Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello exploited fevered speculation about the nature of their relationship to fuel the frenzy behind their blockbuster 2019 duet “Señorita,” a number one single across a record-setting 40 countries worldwide.
Read MoreJohnny and Rosanne Cash keep ‘Tennessee Flat Top Box’ in the family
When Rosanne Cash covered “Tennessee Flat Top Box” for her 1987 album King’s Record Shop, she assumed the venerable country hit was in the public domain. But the song was in fact written by someone she knew intimately: her father, the one and only Johnny Cash, who re-recorded “Tennessee Flat Top Box” for his new label Mercury Records a few months after Rosanne’s rendition topped the country charts.
Read MoreHOW TO USE KORD
Tap and hold to solo any instrument.
Tap instruments (stems) to create your own mix.
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