Today in Rock n' Roll History

Happy belated b-day, John McVie!

A song where he really shines:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyyy0aWGGSw[/ame]

1960 Elvis Presley started a six week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Are You Lonesome Tonight', his third US No.1 of 1960. The single included a spoken passage loosely based on Shakespeare.

1974 John Lennon made his last ever concert appearance when he joined Elton John on stage at Madison Square Gardens in New York City. Lennon performed three songs; 'Whatever Gets You Thru The Night', 'I Saw Her Standing There' and 'Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.'

1987 Taken from the film 'Dirty Dancing', the Jennifer Warnes' duet with Bill Medley '(I've Had) The Time Of My Life', went to No.1 on the US singles chart.

1987 REM had their first entry in the Top 10 on the US singles chart with ‘The One I Love.’

1992 Whitney Houston started a record-breaking fourteen-week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'I Will Always Love You', taken from the 'Bodyguard' soundtrack. The song was written by Dolly Parton.

1999 Cliff Richard started a three-week run at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Millennium Prayer', despite the record being boycotted by most radio stations. It became Cliff's 14th UK No.1.

2000 Madonna played her first British show for more than seven years at London's Brixton Academy. Tickets changed hands for more than £1,000. QXL.com the internet auctioneers sold one pair for £2,204.

1960 Paul McCartney and Pete Best were deported from West Germany after being arrested on suspicion of arson after the hotel room they were staying in mysteriously caught fire. They were released and deported the next day.

1965 This week's UK Top 5 albums, No.5, 'Out Of Our Heads', The Rolling Stones, No.4, 'Highway 61 Revisited', Bob Dylan, No.3, 'Help!', The Beatles, No.2, 'Mary Popins', Soundtrack and at No.1, 'Sound Of Music', Soundtrack.

1969 Yes releases their self-titled debut album.

1980 Abba scored their ninth and last UK No.1 single with 'Super Trouper', the group's 25th Top 40 hit in the UK. The name "Super Trouper" referred to the gigantic spotlights used in stadium concerts.

1986 'Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band Live / 1975-85' started a seven week run at No.1 on the US album chart.

2001 Former Beatles guitarist George Harrison died in Los Angeles of lung cancer aged 58. Following the breakup of The Beatles Harrison had a successful career as a solo artist and later as part of the Traveling Wilburys. The youngest member of The Beatles, (aged 16 when he joined), his compositions include ‘Taxman’, ‘Here Comes the Sun’, ‘Something’, and ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’. Harrison released the acclaimed triple album, All Things Must Pass, in 1970, from which came the worldwide No.1 single ‘My Sweet Lord.’ He was the co-founder of Handmade Films, collaborated with Madonna and the members of Monty Python. An accomplished gardener, Harrison restored the grounds of his 120 roomed English home Friar Park.

1963 The Beatles second album 'With The Beatles' became the first million selling album by a group in the UK.

1971 Genesis releases 'Nursery Cryme'.

1974 Elton John started a ten-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with his 'Greatest Hits'.

1985 Phil Collins had his fifth US No.1 with 'Separate Lives'. The song was taken from the film 'White Nights' and featured Marilyn Martin.

1991 Michael Jackson scored his fourth UK No.1 album with 'Dangerous.'

1991 Milli Vanilli singer Rob Pilatus attempted suicide while staying at The Mondrain Hotel, Los Angeles by taking an overdose of sleeping pills and slashing his wrists.

1994 Tupac Shakur was shot five times during a robbery outside a New York City recording studio.

2006 The sale of Syd Barrett's final belongings were sold by Cheffins auctioneers in Cambridge, England. The sale of the 77 items raised £119,890 ($233,786). Ten paintings alone raised over £55,000 and two bicycles over £10,000. The sale included such things as the armchair he used to sit in, his home-made bread bin, tools, notebooks and binders and books. The sale catalogue described Barrett - who quit Pink Floyd in 1968 - as a man with a "total disinterest in materialism."

2007 During a Christies Rock & Roll auction held the Rockefeller Plaza, New York City a collection of 276 ticket stubs compiled by a rock journalist who covered many of the greatest rock concerts at New York City venues between the late 1960s to the 1990s, sold for $2,000. The tickets included concerts by: Jimi Hendrix; The Who; Rolling Stones; Frank Zappa; Beach Boys; Pink Floyd; Traffic; Allman Brothers; Led Zeppelin; Neil Young; Fleetwood Mac; Grateful Dead and Bruce Springsteen.

1960 Please Come Home for Christmas is Charles Brown's last hit (#21 R&B, #76 pop). The Eagles' cover version becomes a Christmastime hit again in 1978, reaching #18.

1966 Tom Jones was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with his version of 'Green Green Grass Of Home.' It stayed at No.1 for seven weeks giving Decca records its first million selling single by a British artist. Also a No.11 hit in the US.

1976 The Eagles' Hotel California spends the first of a total of eight weeks at Number One.

1982 Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' is released.

1983bNeil Young was sued by Geffen Records because his new music for the label was “not commercial in nature and musically uncharacteristic of his previous albums.”

1987 A Kentucky teacher lost her appeal in the US Supreme Court over her sacking after showing Pink Floyd's film 'The Wall' to her class. The court decided that the film was not suitable for minors with its bad language and sexual content.

2008 Wham's Last Christmas was the most played festive track of the last five years. The Performing Right Society put the 1984 hit at the top of their chart of seasonal songs, just ahead of Band Aid's Do They Know It's Christmas. The Pogues came third with Fairytale of New York, recorded with the late Kirsty MacColl and first released in 1987. Other featured artists include Slade, Mariah Carey and Bruce Springsteen.

1969 Cindy Birdsong of the Supremes was kidnapped at knifepoint by a maintenance man who worked in the building she lived in. She later escaped unharmed by jumping out of his car on the San Diego freeway. The kidnapper was arrested in Las Vegas four days later.

1971 Martha and the Vandellas perform their farewell concert in Detroit. Martha Reeves thereupon embarks on a solo career.

1978 Rod Stewart was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Da Ya Think I'm Sexy', the singers fifth UK chart topper. A plagiarism lawsuit by Brazilian musician Jorge Ben Jor confirmed that the song had been derived from his composition 'Taj Mahal'. Stewart agreed to donate all his royalties from the song to United Nations Children's Fund.

1979 Babe (Styx) was a hit.

1983 MTV aired the full 14-minute version of Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' video for the first time.

1997 A man died after falling from a balcony during a Rolling Stones concert at Pontiac Silverdome, Michigan.

1965 Rolling Stone Keith Richards was knocked unconscious by an electric shock on stage at the Memorial Hall In Sacramento, California, when his guitar made contact with his microphone.

1969 The Rolling Stones recorded 'Brown Sugar' at Muscle Shoals studios. The single went on to be a UK & US No.1.

1971 The Montreux Casino in Switzerland burnt to the ground during a gig by Frank Zappa. The incident is immortalized by Deep Purple's 1973 hit, 'Smoke on the Water.' (some stupid with a flare gun, burned the place to the ground...")

1977 Wings started a nine-week run at No.1 in the UK with 'Mull Of Kintyre'. The first single to sell over 2 million copies in the UK, (it was co-written by Denny Laine who sold his rights to the song when he became bankrupt).

1979 A concert by The Who at The Riverfront Coliseum, Cincinnati, turned to disaster when 11 members of the audience were trampled to death after a stampede to claim unreserved seats.

1962 The Beatles made their London-area debut on television when they appeared in a live broadcast from Wembley on ‘Tuesday Rendezvous’, on ITV station Rediffusion. The Beatles performed live, doing lip-sync performances of ‘Love Me Do’ and 45 seconds of ‘P.S. I Love You.’

1965 The Byrds started a three week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Turn! Turn! Turn!' the group's second No.1. A No.26 hit in the UK. Unlike their first chart topper, ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’, the entire band was allowed to play on the recording, instead of studio musicians.

1971 Led Zeppelin started a two-week run at No.1 on the UK chart with the 'Four Symbols' album. Featuring the 8-minute track 'Stairway To Heaven', the album stayed on the US chart for 1 week short of 5 years, selling over 11 million copies.

1980 Led Zeppelin releases a statement announcing that it is disbanding in the wake of drummer John Bonham's death.

1982 'The John Lennon Collection' started a six-week run at No.1 on the UK album chart.

1988 Roy Orbison played his final ever gig when he appeared in Cleveland, Ohio. Orbison died of a heart attack two days later.

1993 Multi-instrumentalist, producer and composer, Frank Zappa died of prostrate cancer. Zappa recorded many albums with The Mothers Of Invention and solo including the 1969 album 'Hot Rats' and 1974 album 'Apostrophe.' Zappa recorded one of the first concept albums, 'Freak Out'. He married Adelaide Gail Sloatman, in 1967, they had four children: Moon Unit, Dweezil, Ahmet Emuukha Rodan and Diva Thin Muffin Pigeen.

1960 Elvis Presley started a ten-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with 'G.I. Blues'. His fifth US No.1 album.

1964 Lorne Greene star of the NBC TV show 'Bonanza' was at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Ringo', making him the second Canadian (after Paul Anka) to have a US No.1 single. The song was a No.22 hit in the UK.

1965 The Beatles played their last ever show in their hometown of Liverpool when they appeared at The Liverpool Empire during the group's final UK tour. Only 5,100 tickets were available, but there were 40,000 applications for tickets. The group also had the UK No.1 single with 'We Can Work It Out / Day Tripper.'

1970 Amazing Grace' by Judy Collins entered the UK singles chart for the first of eight times, it spent a total of 67 weeks on the chart never making the No.1 position.

1987 Belinda Carlisle went to No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Heaven Is a Place on Earth', the ex Go-Go's member first solo No.1, also a No.1 hit in the UK. The promotional video was directed by Academy Award-winning actress Diane Keaton and features an appearance of Carlisle's husband Morgan Mason.

1992 Whitney Houston started a ten-week run at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'I Will Always Love You'. The longest ever run at No.1 for a female artist the Dolly Parton penned song was taken from the Bodyguard soundtrack.

2004 Band Aid 20 started a four week at No.1 on the UK singles chart with a new version of 'Do They Know It’s Christmas.' The third time the song had reached No.1. The new version featured, Joss Stone, Busted, Chris Martin, Bono, Justin Hawkins, Dizzee Rascal, Tom Chaplin, Ms Dynamite, Beverly Knight, Will Young, Jamelia, Fran Healy, Sugababes, Dido and Robbie Williams.

1966 The Beatles recorded Christmas and New Year's greetings for pirate radio stations Radio Caroline and Radio London. Both stations were broadcasting from ships anchored off the British coastline.

1967 The Beatles started a seven-week run at No.1 in the UK with 'Hello Goodbye' their 13th No.1 single.

1968 James Taylor is issued in England on the Beatles' Apple label. Taylor is the first non-Beatle signed to Apple.

1969 Led Zeppelin made their debut on the US singles chart with 'Whole Lotta Love', it went on to make No.4 on the chart and was the first of six Top 40 singles for the group in the US. During the bands career, Zeppelin never released any singles in the UK.

1969 The Rolling Stones played a free festival at Altamont in California, along with Jefferson Airplane, Santana, The Flying Burrito Brothers and Crosby Stills Nash & Young. Rolling Stones fan Meredith Hunter was stabbed to death as the group played by Hell's Angels who'd been hired to police the event. It's claimed Hunter was waving a revolver. One other man drowned, two men were killed by in a hit-and run accident and two babies were born.

1975 Paul Simon went to No.1 on the US album chart with 'Still Crazy After All These Years', his first US No.1 solo album.

1986 Europe were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'The Final Countdown'. They became only the second Swedish act to score a UK No.1. The song reached No.1 in 25 countries and the song's lyrics were inspired by David Bowie's song 'Space Oddity'.

1988 American singer songwriter Roy Orbison died of a heart attack aged 52. Scored the 1964 UK & US No.1 single 'Pretty Woman', plus over 20 US & 30 UK Top 40 singles including ‘Only the Lonely’ and ‘Crying’. Formed his first band The Wink Westerners in 1949, was a member of The Traveling Wilburys (known as Lefty Wilbury) with Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty and had the 1988 UK No.21 single 'Handle With Care'. Orbison endured a great deal of tragedy in