Digest: Bruce Springsteen Writes Letter to the Editor; NBA Investigates Jay-Z

Bruce Springsteen on location for a video shoot in Asbury Park, New Jersey

Bobby Bank/WireImage

Bruce Springsteen Sends Letter to Editor
Bruce Springsteen sent an letter to the editor the Asbury Park Press in response to the paper's March 27th cover story "As poverty rises, cuts target aid." According to the singer, the article is "one of the few that highlights the contradictions between a policy of large tax cuts, on the hand, and cuts in services to those in the most dire conditions, on the other." [Asbury Park Press]

NBA Investigates Jay-Z
The NBA is investigating Jay-Z's visit to the Kentucky Wildcats' locker room on Sunday, as the league's rules prohibits team personnel from having contact with players who are not yet eligible for draft. As part-owner of the New Jersey Nets, Jay-Z is subject to a large fine if the NBA finds that his conduct was unethical. [ESPN]

Audience Member Plunges to Death at Furthur Gig
A 19-year-old fan fell to his death during a Furthur concert at the University of Pittsburgh yesterday. According to reports on the scene, the man charged through a window at the arena after getting down in a football stance and shouting, "Hike!" [NY Post]

New Jane's Addiction Track Surfaces
A new Jane's Addiction song called "End to the Lies" has turned up online after frontman Perry Farrell premiered the track on Chilean radio yesterday. The song is the first Jane's cut to surface featuring the band's new bassist, Dave Sitek of the TV on the Radio. [Stereogum]

Men At Work Lose Plagiarism Appeal
EMI has lost its appeal of a court ruling that Men At Work's 1981 hit "Down Under" was based on a folk song for Girl Scouts called "Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree." The label argued that the shared elements were only a tribute to the folk song, but a panel of three judges decided against overturning the prior ruling. [Billboard]

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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.”

More Song Stories entries »

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