Misty Mountain Hop is an iconic 1971 Led Zeppelin song the title of which is associated with the mountains described by J. R. R. Tolkien in The Hobbit. Such parallels are by no means accidental as the band has repeatedly featured the characters and locations…

Bob Dylan's track Blind Willie McTell is perhaps the best tribute to this outstanding traveling street artist who has recorded about five dozen songs under various nicknames over several decades starting in the 1920s. Indeed, hardly anyone has reason to disagree…

Caldonia is a 1945 song released by Louis Jordan, an American songwriter and saxophonist whose popularity in the 1940s and 1950s earned him the bombastic nickname "The King of the Jukebox". The track, partially written in the jump blues genre, opens with…

El Manisero or The Peanut Vendor is an essential rumba song written circa 1928 by the leading Cuban composer Moisés Simons. Currently, the song is associated with the first breakthrough of Caribbean music on the European and American pop scenes, where it…

The sarabande is a fiery carnival dance that originated in the 16th century in Central America and then spread to Spain where it was banned by the Catholic Church. Despite the decade-long ban, the adaptation of the sarabande as an aristocratic court event…

The widely known La Bamba epitomizes one of the most striking examples of the ways in which an old folk tune could be popularized. According to some sources, the melody originated in the Mexican state of Veracruz more than 200 years ago where it traditionally…

Ladytron is one of Roxy Music's most noteworthy tracks released on their 1972 debut album. One of the song's strongest points is its ability to encompass the band's philosophy of sound that harmoniously combines classical instruments with familiar rock sets…

Pancho and Lefty is perhaps the best-known song of American songwriter Townes Van Zandt released on his sixth studio album in 1972. Performing in modest clubs and distributing his music only through minor labels, Van Zandt was never widely popular, and thus…

Tumbling Dice is the lead single from the Rolling Stones' Exile on Main St. released in 1972, infamous for its innovative but extremely chaotic recording process. The majority of the arrangements were recorded in the basement of Villa Nellcôte, a French mansion…

Mexicali Blues was first released by Bob Weir, an acclaimed rhythm guitarist, vocalist, and founding member of the Grateful Dead. In fact, as a solo project, the 1972 Ace album can be safely included in the Grateful Dead discography, given that all band members…

Knights of Cydonia by English alternative rock band Muse has been repeatedly placed at the top of many fan-voted charts as the best Muse song soon after its release in 2006. Owing its title to the Martian region of Cydonia, the song claims to be space-themed…

Seven Seas of Rhye first appeared as an instrumental track on Queen's 1973 self-titled debut album and later released as a song with the same title on their 1974 sophomore album Queen II. The music was presumably composed by the bandleader Freddie Mercury…

I Shot The Sheriff is one of Bob Marley's best-known songs first released on the 1973 album Burnin' and popularized a year later by Eric Clapton whose rock cover became the number one hit in America. For half a century, fans have been trying to unearth the…

D'yer Mak'er, released on Led Zeppelin's 1973 album Houses of the Holy, remains the most controversial track the band has ever recorded. Soon after its release, the song received mostly negative and at times angry reviews while fans fiercely debate over its…

The polyphonic structure of Western classical music distinguishes it from other musical traditions such as Indian classics where a lone melodic line is accompanied by a developed rhythm section. In contrast, polyphonic music involves the interaction between…

Terraplane Blues is the first single released by Robert Johnson—a traveling blues performer deeply revered by many rock musicians of the 1960s, although his surviving legacy is limited to only 29 songs recorded in two sessions in 1936 and 1937. The song title…

The polyphonic structure of Western classical music distinguishes it from other musical traditions such as Indian classics where a lone melodic line is accompanied by a developed rhythm section. In contrast, polyphonic music involves the interaction between…

The harmonic analysis of The Beatles' output reveals their particular devotion to the Ionian mode, which is found in fifty of their songs, and nine of those tracks are written using just three primary chords. One of the simplest and at the same time most…