Neither songs nor stories will employ independent contractors (7)
I believe the answer is:
muscles
'contractors' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are plural nouns, I can't understand how one could define the other.
'neither songs nor stories will employ independent' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'independent' could be 'us' (the puzzle setter and their Independent colleagues) and 'us' is found in the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for muscles that I've seen before include "Contracting body parts" , "Body parts like biceps" , "Through them bodily movement is effected" , "Vital factors" , "lot of beef" .)