Bruce Springsteen, Jay-Z Lead Obama Swing State Drive

Many people consider this year's presidential election the most important in generations, so it's no wonder that a long list of musicians have stepped up to offer their support for the candidate of their choice. As election day draws closer, artists like Bruce Springsteen, Jay-Z, the Grateful Dead, Billy Joel and the Beastie Boys have organized special shows and tours through battleground states to raise awareness and encourage people to stand and be counted. "We want to be of as much use to the candidate as we can be," says Dead drummer Mickey Hart. "The stakes are so high." Click below for more on the slate of Obama support concerts, including reactions from the Obama campaign.

• Springsteen, Jay-Z Lead Obama Swing State Drive

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

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