R. Kelly "Employee" Reportedly Threatened to Kill Witness

According to court documents dating before the R. Kelly child pornography trial, an "employee" of Kelly's allegedly threatened to kill the key witness in the prosecution's case if she "snitched" against the singer by testifying in his trial. No charges were ever filed against the Kelly associate, and key witness Lisa Van Patten testified for the prosecution in the case that found Kelly not guilty of all charges. Van Patten also testified before the trial that another associate of Kelly's offered her $100,000 for the infamous sex tape.

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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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