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Song Stories

“Lean on Me”

Bill Withers | 1972

Bill Withers dug back to his childhood in the coal mining town of Slab Fork, West Virginia when he wrote this Number One hit in Los Angeles. A product of his upbringing, where neighbors helped neighbors — and strangers — he noted that big cities did not have that same sense of a warm and giving community. While sitting at his Wurlitzer electric piano, the phrase “lean on me” sprung to mind. “What would I say that would cause me to say ‘lean on me’?” Withers pondered. “At that point, it's between you and your actual feelings, you and your morals and what you're really like."

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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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