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Song Stories

“Do the Panic”

Phantom Planet | 2008

"Panic" has appeared on two Phantom Planet albums: 2004's Phantom Planet: Negatives and a reworked version on 2008's Raise the Dead, but the latter version had some latent secrets. "There's a few lyrical tasties on 'Do the Panic,' our single, that I didn't realize were a part of the lyrics until after I'd heard the song, right before it goes into the chorus" Darren Robinson, the band's guitarist, pointed out. Lead singer Alex Greenwald concurred about the clandestine nature. "There's a lot of weird, weird stuff on our record, hidden" he said. "I'm not at liberty to say. Some horrible things."

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Song Stories

“I'm Yours”

Jason Mraz | 2008

Jason Mraz re-emerged after his disappointing second album with this lead single, a Jack Johnson-esque ditty about giving yourself fully to someone else. The success of the reggae-tinged song (it earned two Grammy nods and a spot on the Billboard singles chart for well over a year) was something the folk-pop singer never predicted when he wrote it in 15 minutes at home. "I played a happy-hippie chord progression that would probably work without 50 different Bob Marley songs," he told Rolling Stone. "I thought, 'It's too novelty. This is a nursery rhyme,'" concluding that "you can never guess what's gonna be a hit."

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