.

Song Stories

“I Don't Want to Wait”

Paula Cole | 1998

A former cheerleader, prom queen and backup singer for Peter Gabriel, Cole had a lot to be happy about in the late Nineties. But this living-for-the-moment song was inspired by a sobering time in her life — a final visit with her grandfather in Massachusetts. "I went home to Rockport that summer ... about a week after I arrived, he died," she said. "So that song has his spirit in it." Though Cole has said she really isn't a fan of television, this song was a guaranteed hit once it was chosen as the theme for Dawson's Creek.

prev
“Graceland”
Paul Simon | 1986
Song Stories Main Next
“Last Kiss”
Pearl Jam | 1999

blog comments powered by Disqus

Photos & Videos

Go To Content

Random Notes: Hottest Rock Pictures

Go To Content Play Video

Video: Dave Grohl Sits in With the Rolling Stones

Go To Content

Gallery: Ray Manzarek Through the Years

Best Ever Lists
500 Greatest Albums of All Time

Other Lists

Song Stories

“Too Close”

Next | 1998

Next was formed in Minneapolis when the uncle of Terry "T-Low" and Raphael "Tweety" Brown, who was a gospel choir director, introduced the brothers to Robert Lavelle "R.L." Huggar. Sounds of Blackness singer Ann Nesby groomed the R&B group before handing them over to Naughty by Nature's KayGee, who wrote and produced "Too Close." The idea for the song was sparked "from a conversation we had with several girls at a nightclub," explained T-Low. "It's talking about the club scene, with guys getting out of hand and the female telling him to back up, asking, 'What are you doing?'" 

More Song Stories entries »