The Girl in the Song: The Stories Behind 50 Rock Classics
Many of us know that Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline” was inspired by Caroline Kennedy and that “Peggy Sue” was the girlfriend of Buddy Holly’s drummer. But who among us knew that “Mrs. Potter’s Lullaby,” by Counting Crows, was written about Monica Potter, the actress? Or that the first verse of “Fire and Rain,” James Taylor’s classic, was a eulogy for a dead friend? Or that “The Girl from Ipanema” was Heloisa Eneida Menezes Paes Pinto, a 15-year-old head-turner in Rio de Janeiro? Well, maybe pop-music fanatics will know all of these facts, just like they’ll know most of the rest of this book’s stories. But the book isn’t written for them; its audience is the ordinary reader, to whom the songs are familiar, but their origins remain a mystery. The author, a music historian and biographer, writes in a lively style, devoting a few pages to each song and then moving on to the next. A slim book but one packed with entertaining information. --David Pitt