News Ticker: T.I., Bob Dylan, The Decemberists, Band of Horses

In a short video interview posted on his own Trapmuzik site, T.I. reveals his new post-prison album is going to be "different in many ways," adding "Paper Trail was more about thoughts, this is more about feelings." He says the "significantly more aggressive" August disc is "goin' hard like classic T.I."

Renée Zellweger sings a cover of Bob Dylan's "Life Is Hard" in My Own Love Song. Dylan oversaw the full soundtrack for the film, which inspired his 2009 album Together Through Life. Consequence of Sound has a clip of the performance and the full track list.

The Decemberists are recording with R.E.M.'s Peter Buck, writes Pitchfork, spying a Colin Meloy tweet that reads, "First official day of #6 practice; made Peter Buck play my fake-REM riffs and he didn't seem perturbed. Nor litigious."

Band of Horses have unveiled their new track "Compliments" off their May 18th disc Infinite Arms on their official website.

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  MUSIC Exclusive Live Chat With Linkin Park and Incubus
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  POLITICS Matt Taibbi: Jon Corzine Is the Original Zimmerman
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  VIDEOS Exclusive Premiere: Tenacious D's 'Tinnitus'

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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