By all means check out Joe Berlinger's unmissable Under African Skies, a documentary that shows how Paul Simon defied a U.N. cultural boycott to work in South Africa during apartheid to record his landmark Graceland album in 1985. Simon's virtuosity, intensified by a 2011 reunion concert with the South African musicians who helped him make history, raises the potent and still relevant question of artistic freedom versus realpolitik. Powered by Simon's brilliance, Under African Skies is a cultural lightning bolt that soars on its music and an unshakable belief in the transcendence of art.

Related
• The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time: Paul Simon's 'Graceland'

“He Will Break Your Heart”

A lightly swinging Latin-influenced, almost cha-cha groove and close harmonies decorated Jerry Butler's early soul hit "He Will Break Your Heart," delivering a stately warning that his rival would never love his girl like he did. The melody came to Butler as he was driving on the highway from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Philadelphia with Curtis Mayfield, and as Butler told Rolling Stone, "I just sang the melody and Curtis put the chords to it." The song's premise, Butler added, "was something that I'd lived ...The lyric was an experience rather than a revelation. Whereas music is usually a revelation."