Today in Rock n' Roll History

1956 The "Million Dollar Quartet"—Presley, Perkins, Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis—records old gospel, country and pop songs at an impromptu session. The recordings aren't officially released until the mid-Eighties.

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.

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 Frank Zappa dies of prostate cancer at home in Los Angeles, California.

Pretty darn good weren't they P47?

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.

1960, Paul McCartney and Pete Best were arrested for pinning a condom to a brick wall and then igniting it. The two were told to leave Germany and The Beatles returned home, discouraged.

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.'

1972 Roxy Music embarks on their first US tour opening for JoJo Gunne, Edgar Winter and others.
2006 Beatles lyrics handwritten by Sir Paul McCartney to an early version of Maxwell's Silver Hammer sold for $192,000 (£97,000) at an auction in New York. A guitar owned by Jimi Hendrix fetched $168,000 (£85,000), a notebook containing lyrics written by Bob Marley, sold for $72,000 (£36,445) and a poem penned by Doors frontman Jim Morrison made $49,000 (£25,500) at the Christie's sale.

I missed one Dec 4.

Tommy Bolin died at the age of 25. He would have been 49 years young. The virtuoso guitarist died of a heroin overdose.

Tommy may be best known for his work with Deep Purple, but for me his BEST work will always be that done as Joe Walsh's replacement in the James Gang. "Bang" is one of the best albums that the James Gang released and I am not excluding the classics that Joe led the Gang in. "Miami" also featured Tommy before he moved on.

The James Gang had a hard time coming up with someone who could fill the gap that Joe Walsh left empty when he moved on to a solo career. Bolin came close to doing just that. Die Hard James Gang fans often over emphasize the creativity achieved both before and after Walsh, but it is my opinion that only with Bolin did they come close!

Give songs like "Alexis" and "Standing In The Rain". When Fox and Peters asked Joe about Tommy, Joe told them that they would be absolutely foolish not to bring him on. He brought much needed talents as a lyricist as well as composer and instrumentalist.

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.

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 One hit wonders Steam started a two week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye'. The song became a UK No.5 single for girl group Bananarama in 83.

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 his life. His first wife, Claudette died in a motorcycle accident in 1966 and two of his three sons, died in a house fire.

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Originally Posted by Koala

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.

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Doesn't six sound like a low number of Zep songs to hit the Top 40 singles charts here in the US?

And does anyone know why they released no singles in the UK? Seems strange to me.

They just didn't want to as far as I know. When they started the era of the 'singles band' was over & the 'album band' era had kicked in. Let's face it, none of their songs are exactly Top 40 material, are they, not even their ballads.

That is strange that Led Zeppelin didn't release singles in the UK. I'm not surprised about them only having 6 Top 40 hits though. I know I can't name more than one song by them, although perhaps I'm not representative as they were a bit before my time. I can say that what I have heard of them doesn't sound like hit material to me. They were played a lot on "Eagles Radio" and I noticed that the Led Zeppelin songs played seemed to have an odd quasi-"psychedelic" flavor and weren't very melodic. I can't even remember what the songs were - I just remember thinking that the songs seemed kind of meandering in structure and sounded dissonant at times. That kind of stuff isn't gonna be top 40. I'm not trying to diss them; obviously a lot of folks are into that kind of sound (including a lot of our discerning board members ;) ). However, it seems to be an acquired taste; it's definitely not everyone's cup of tea.

1967 The Beatles Apple boutique opened its doors. The store closed seven months later when all the goods were given away free to passers by.

1968 Janis Joplin performs for the last time as a member of Big Brother and the Holding Company. Two weeks later, she debuts her new group, the Kozmic Blues Band.

1968 The Beatles 'White Album' started a seven-week run at No.1 on the UK chart. The double set was the first on the Apple label and featured 'Back In The USSR', 'Dear Prudence', and the Harrison song 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps.'

1971 Genesis supported by Roxy Music appeared at The Hobbits Garden, Wimbledon, England.

1974 Genesis hits #10 in the UK with 'The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway'.

1984 a benefit concert for Ethiopia was held at The Royal Albert Hall, London, featuring, Nick Heyward, Feargal Sharkey, Julian Lennon, Mike Rutherford and others.

1991 George Michael and Elton John were at No.1 in the UK with a live version of 'Don't Let The Sun Go down On Me', (a hit for Elton in 1974). All proceeds from the hit went to aids charities.

2005 The MBE medal that John Lennon returned to the Queen was found in a royal vault at St James' Palace. Lennon returned his medal in November, 1969 with a letter accompanying saying, "Your Majesty, I am returning my MBE as a protest against Britain's involvement in the Nigeria-Biafra thing, against our support of America in Vietnam and against Cold Turky slipping down the charts. With Love, John Lennon." Historians were calling for the medal to be put on public display.

Zeppelin...not hit material.... http://bestsmileys.com/crying/2.gif you guys are breaking my heart http://bestsmileys.com/crying/2.gif and for FP to say something that awful....http://bestsmileys.com/crying/2.gif you're killing me here, I thought you understood!!! http://bestsmileys.com/crying/2.gif

JK :hilarious: Like I've said before, they aren't everyone's cup of tea (and you are all so very WRONG!!!;)) but I really did think they had more top 40 than that. Then how do we explain their popularity? If they weren't being played on the radio, how did people hear of them in the first place? Interesting!!