Free Fallin' (John Mayer)
2008
Two days was all Petty and Lynne needed; Mayer's acoustic version, taped at the Nokia Theatre, became a single itself.
★ 2.3
The Songs canon
Sourced and sung.
Every song chosen by hand, with the recording to play it.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.
Black Velvet
1989
Ward got the idea riding a bus of Elvis fans to the tenth Graceland vigil, and Myles won a Grammy.
★ 3.1
Waiting on the World to Change
2006
Steve Jordan on drums, Pino Palladino on bass, and a Grammy for a chorus about feeling politically stuck.
★ 3.9
Run-Around
1994
Popper wrote it about an unrequited crush, then watched it sit on the Hot 100 for forty-nine weeks.
★ 4.1
Crazy (Aerosmith)
1994 · From Get a Grip
Desmond Child helped Tyler and Perry finish it, and Liv Tyler's debut video kept MTV busy through 1994.
★ 4.1
Hello OperatorThe White Stripes
Hello Operator
2000 · From De Stijl
Jack White turned a children's clapping rhyme into a complaint about the phone company, cut in his own living room.
★ 4.3
Dreaming with a Broken HeartJohn Mayer
Dreaming with a Broken Heart
2007
Pino Palladino on bass, Ricky Peterson on piano, Steve Jordan producing, and Mayer singing the moment the dream ends.
★ 4.3
Daughters
2004
Mayer lobbied his label against releasing it, then won Song of the Year in 2005 and said so onstage.
★ 4.4
My Doorbell
2005 · From Get Behind Me Satan
Piano and Meg's drums instead of a riff, cut at White's Detroit house, thematically the album's one cheerful track.
★ 4.7
The Pusher
1968
Hoyt Axton's mother held the publishing back over its language; Easy Rider then made Steppenwolf's version unavoidable.
★ 4.8
Something to Talk About
1991
A Shirley Eikhard song Raitt carried to number five, her biggest American hit, and a Grammy for that vocal.
★ 4.9
What It's LikeEverlast
What It's Like
1998
Everlast left House of Pain, picked up an acoustic guitar, and topped both rock charts with three street portraits.
★ 4.9
Hang Me Up To Dry
2007
Cut first for the Up in Rags EP, all four members co-producing, a clothesline standing in for one-sided love.
★ 5.0
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room
2006
Never a single, still platinum: Mayer, Steve Jordan and Pino Palladino playing a relationship that both parties know is finished.
★ 5.0
Here I Go Again
1982
Jon Lord's Hammond organ on the 1982 original, a heartbreak song Coverdale wrote in Portugal, later a number one.
★ 5.1
Gravity
2006
Alicia Keys sings backing behind Pino Palladino's bass, and Mayer called it the most important song he has written.
★ 5.3
Strange BrewCream
Strange Brew
1967 · From Disraeli Gears
Pappalardi and Gail Collins wrote new words over a shelved "Lawdy Mama" take, and Clapton borrows Albert King wholesale.
★ 5.5
Give Me One Reason
1995 · From New Beginning
Chapman played it live for seven years before recording it, then a loose blues shuffle became her biggest hit.
★ 5.5
What Is and What Should Never Be
1969 · From Led Zeppelin II
Among Plant's first songwriting credits, a CBS contract having blocked him on the debut, over guitars panning across both channels.
★ 5.6
Rosanna
1982
Jeff Porcaro's half-time shuffle carried it to Record of the Year, and drummers have been chasing that groove since.
★ 5.6
Hold On (Alabama Shakes)
2012
Four Alabama day-jobbers paid for their own sessions at a Nashville home studio, and Rolling Stone named it 2012's best.
★ 5.7
Yellow Ledbetter
1991
McCready's riff was a Ten outtake, and Vedder improvised a lyric he has been rewriting onstage ever since.
★ 5.9
The Wind Cries MaryJimi Hendrix
The Wind Cries Mary
1967
Twenty minutes at the tail end of the Fire session, and Hendrix trading fire for something quiet and blue.
★ 5.9
The Way It Is
1986
Hornsby wrote the words first in a Van Nuys garage; that piano figure later became the spine of Tupac's Changes.
★ 6.2
Heartbreaker
1969 · From Led Zeppelin II
Page cut the unaccompanied solo at Atlantic while the rest of the track was taped across town at A&R.
★ 6.2
Break on Through (To the Other Side)The Doors
Break on Through (To the Other Side)
1967 · From The Doors
Densmore's bossa nova drum feel, Krieger's riff borrowed from a Butterfield blues cover, and a refrain their producer censored.
★ 6.3
The JokerSteve Miller Band
The Joker
1973
A lyric lifted from "Lovey Dovey", a misheard doo-wop coinage, and a Levi's ad that made it Britain's number one.
★ 6.3
Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood
1965
Written after Horace Ott quarreled with his girlfriend, and sped from Simone's ballad into Burdon's pleading.
★ 6.4
CrossroadsCream
Crossroads
1969 · From Wheels of Fire
Cut live at Winterland in March 1968, Robert Johnson's blues sped up under two of Clapton's most copied solos.
★ 6.4
Beast of Burden
1978 · From Some Girls
A thank-you note to Jagger for shouldering the band, by Richards' account, with Wood taking the solo.
★ 6.5
I Can't Make You Love Me
1991
Bruce Hornsby's piano behind a vocal Raitt cut in one take, then refused to try again.
★ 6.7
Mary Jane's Last Dance
1993 · From Greatest Hits
Originally called Indiana Girl, until Petty decided he couldn't sing that line; Stan Lynch's last sessions with the Heartbreakers.
★ 6.7
Truckin'
1970 · From American Beauty
Hunter's lyric folds in a 1970 New Orleans bust, and the Library of Congress declared the record a national treasure.
★ 6.9
White RoomCream
White Room
1968 · From Wheels of Fire
A 5/4 intro that worried the label, Pappalardi's violas, Baker's timpani, and Clapton's wah-wah doing the talking.
★ 7.0
The Boys are Back in Town
1976
Gorham and Robertson's twin leads on a track the band nearly left off Jailbreak; Kentucky radio saved it.
★ 7.0
With a Little Help From My Friends (Joe Cocker)
1968
Cocker slowed a Beatles album track to gospel tempo, with Jimmy Page on guitar and Tommy Eyre's organ intro.
★ 7.1
November Rain
1992 · From Use Your Illusion I
Slash's solo grew from an improvisation, Rose had chased the song since 1986, and nine minutes went top three.
★ 7.2
Whipping PostThe Allman Brothers Band
Whipping Post
1969 · From The Allman Brothers Band
An ironing board cover, charcoal from spent matches, and Berry Oakley's bass counting the intro in eleven menacing beats.
★ 7.2
Down By The RiverNeil Young
Down By The River
1969 · From Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
Young wrote it in bed with a 103-degree fever, and Crazy Horse stretched it to nine ragged minutes.
★ 7.2
Dream On
1973 · From Aerosmith
Tyler had the tune on his family's New Hampshire lodge piano years before Aerosmith; a reissue reached number six.
★ 7.2