The Secret Life of Songs
Episodes
#20 - A Case of You / Joni Mitchell
20 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Writing candidly about intimate, private moments and feelings is today such an accepted practice in pop songwriting that it can be startling to go bac...
#19 - Streets of Philadelphia / Bruce Springsteen
06 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When Bruce Springsteen was asked why he was invited to write the theme song for 'Philadelphia', the first mainstream motion picture about th...
#18 - I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me) / Whitney Houston
23 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
'I Wanna Dance with Somebody' is now safely embedded in the pantheon of great songs: a 2023 Billboard poll named it the greatest pop song of...
#17 - Time After Time / Cyndi Lauper
09 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Of all the pop songs released in the era this series has been looking at, there are few which command the depth of love and affection as Cyndi Lauper&...
#16 - 9 to 5 / Dolly Parton
25 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Why do we work? The answer might seem obvious; as teenagers the world over have long been told, the world does not owe you a living, but predictions b...
#15 - Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) / Kate Bush
11 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
‘When I was little, I really wanted to be a psychiatrist. That's what I always said at school. I had this idea of helping people, I suppose, bu...
#14 - Good Life / Inner City
28 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The 1970s were a period of intensifying fears about the rapid spread of technological complexity in the wake of environmental catastrophes such as the...
#13 - SOS / ABBA
14 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Has there ever been a pop band which has been as loved - and as hated - as ABBA? Even in the period before they appeared on the Eurovision Song Contes...
#12 - Family Affair / Sly and the Family Stone
14 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When people first encountered Sly and the Family Stone in their early performances in San Francisco they were often struck by how much they really see...
#11 - I Feel Love / Donna Summer
14 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
When Brian Eno first heard 'I Feel Love' by Donna Summer, produced by Giorgio Moroder in 1977, he declared that he had 'heard the sound...
Series 2 trailer
07 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The return of the award-winning music analysis podcast, The Secret Life of Songs, is a major event in the worlds of podcasting and pop music writing. ...
#10 - River Deep — Mountain High / Ike & Tina Turner
27 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How does a record make us feel like we're in a vast space, one that we've never experienced, one that may not exist? In this episode, the la...
#9 - The Makings of You / Curtis Mayfield
13 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Since I first started listening to pop music, I've wondered about what's really going on in songs about love. Something seems to haunt expre...
#8 - Walkin' After Midnight & Crazy / Patsy Cline
30 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
When Patsy Cline first heard Willie Nelson's demo version of 'Crazy', she didn't like it, thinking it sounded too vulnerable and h...
#7 - Cigarettes and Coffee / Otis Redding
16 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What does a chorus do in a pop song? Among our most basic assumptions about what will happen in a pop song is the expectation that it will lead us tow...
#6 - Jealous Guy / John Lennon
01 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The history of rock music is in large part a history of men writing condescending and degrading songs about women, so it's interesting when a son...
#5 - Son of a Preacher Man / Dusty Springfield
17 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The story of Billy-Rae, the preacher's son, and the singer of 'Son of a Preacher Man', stealing away from their parents to discover lov...
#4 - God Only Knows / The Beach Boys
04 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The story of the Beach Boys starting out as preppy Californian surf-popsters to become Rock n Roll Hall of Famers responsible for 'Greatest Album...
#3 - You're All I Need to Get By / Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The classic Motown duet, 'You're All I Need to Get By', seems to be about commitment - about a love which has recently been embarked on...
#2 - One Fine Day / The Chiffons
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The 1960s girl group genre might seem an odd place to find tragedy, particularly when it's wrapped in such apparently joyful music as The Chiffon...
#1 - Bring It On Home to Me / Sam Cooke
21 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How does a song make us feel like we want to go home? that we miss someone who has left us at a home that now feels nothing but empty? that they may n...
Series 1 trailer
13 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
‘The Secret Life of Songs’ is a new podcast series exploring ten classic pop recordings to get to the heart of why they mean so much to us. Hosted...