Professor of Rock

Okay, okay. I’ve been meaning to do this episode for years. And well, I just can’t put it off any longer. Today, I’m counting down my Top 10 picks for the dumbest and cheesiest celebrity music projects that no one asked for… Songs and albums spearheaded by actors and famous personalities who just had to have their cake and eat it too. The good news is that most of these celebrities had a day job to fall back on… because I tell ya, their music careers weren’t going to pay the bills. There’s the story of the larger-than-life WWF icon Hulk Hogan who once claimed he was ready to throw in the towel on his wrestling career to play bass for Metallica. He sent in an audition tape, but it was a pipe dream. Then there’s the teen movie star Corey Feldman, who turned down a guaranteed #1 hit from Michael Jackson to write his own song instead… and his music career has been mocked ever since. And finally, there’s Eddie Murphy, who won a hundred thousand dollar bet by proving he could make a “serious” music album with no jokes in it. But he never got paid. Let’s get into it.
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A great cover song takes a track you thought you knew, turns it inside out, and makes you forget it ever belonged to anyone else. Today we're counting down the Top 10 greatest covers ever recorded and telling the jaw-dropping stories behind them… including one about Joe Cocker, who walked out onto the biggest stage in rock history, launched into a version of a borrowed Beatles song so primal and transcendent that he summoned a literal rainstorm in the process. And it was from the greatest band ever, who were deemed un-coverable. But even the Beatles conceded that it was better than theirs. Plus there’s the rock and roll pioneer who watched a rival Elvis steal his song while he was lying incapacitated in a hospital bed. And it became the definitive version, but his rival was actually just trying to help him. Plus a cover song that shocked us all. Johnny Cash recorded it because he knew he was about to meet his maker and captured a moment that broke our hearts and even made the original artist, Trent Reznor, admit the song no longer belonged to him…Let’s get into a great debate about the greatest cover songs ever recorded…

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We need this show right now. I have always believed that music is the universal language, it is the thread that weaves our entire civilization together. Songs serve as hallmarks of our history and as the checkpoints of our lives. Think about it. Songs are like time machines that transport us back to the moments that matter most in our lives. And in times of adversity and in our darkest hours, great music can motivate us to rise above anything. Today, I going to count down my 7 picks for the stories of songs that have rescued someone in times of distress, literally saving lives. Including the story of two men trapped in an underground mining disaster, who survived in large part thanks to an iPod loaded with rock music from one specific band: The Foo Fighters. And then Runaway Train and its milk carton-inspired music video became a powerful crime-solving campaign, saving dozens of missing teens around the world. But our countdown starts with a legendary NBA player who sat in his truck with a loaded weapon ready to take his own life. Until this 1 Pearl Jam song started playing and saved his life… He went on to win 3 consecutive NBA Championships. Let’s do it
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Coming up… It’s time to rewrite history and give the greatest songs of 1973 their real due. These Top 10 hits missed the #1 spot on the charts, but as you’ll see, they were all actually better than the songs that did hit #1. Let’s put it right. So many classics here. Including the song that a legendary singer wrote as a parody of Bob Dylan. He basically did an impersonation of him, and it made the song an all-time classic.
Plus the rock song that Paul McCartney wrote in mere minutes on the spot that was rejected by an iconic movie franchise that wanted a lounge act to replace him on the song… As well as the classic rock song that every casual rock fan knows by heart but almost nobody can remember who sings it. It’s one of the most missed trivia questions in music. There’s also Long Train Running by the Doobie Brothers, a song that came from a 10-minute jam that they sat on for 3 years until their producer forced them to put words to it, and it became a classic.

And finally, there’s the classic Steely Dan hit Do It Again that confused the hell out of fans because the lead singer was so overcome by stage fright, he had the band’s backup singer tackle it in concert. Leaving fans trying to figure out who really sang it?
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Watch at your own peril….this one is spooky and creepy…Rock has always flirted with the dark side — but some stories go too far beyond the music. Today we're pulling back the curtain on the most harrowing true crime stories the rock world has ever produced. It’s our latest countdown of Rock True Crime Stories… “Halloween Edition.” We’ve got the twisted story of rising star Bobby Fuller on the verge of breaking through to the big time… but he was found unresponsive in a car soaked in gasoline. All signs pointed to foul play. But police ruled it out without even dusting for a single fingerprint. So what really happened? Then there is one of the most dangerous criminals in American history who told investigators that AC/DC's music had soundtracked his crimes. The media firestorm that blew up held the band responsible for the actions of a monster they'd never met. PLUS Frankie Teardrop, one of the scariest songs ever recorded…It was so disturbing the singer threw up in the middle of it. And for decades, several radio stations have sponsored huge contests to see if a listener could get through the song in the dark. Nobody could. Can you? Let's get into it.

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