It was today in 1964 during a tour of Britain that The Rolling Stones were denied midday admission to the dining room at the Grand Hotel in Bristol where they were staying, not because of their long (for the time) hair, but because they were not wearing jackets and ties. The next day the London Daily Express ran the story under the headline "Rolling Stones Gather No Lunch".
It was today in 1969 that Vancouver BC rock band Spring, Boston folksinger Jaime Brockett, Seattle hippie jug band Translove Airlines, Three Dog Night, and already making their second Seattle appearance...Led Zeppelin played at the Green Lake Aqua Theater. It was unusually hot and sunny, just like this weekend. Built in 1950, it had been home to The Green Lake Aqua Follies (mostly synchronized swimming and diving from the two 4-story tall towers), theater productions, and your odd Bob Hope appearance, but fell into disuse after the 1962 World's Fair left a couple of large indoor venues ( it rains a lot in Seattle) at what became Seattle Center. Somewhere around 1000 people bought tickets, and somewhere around another 1000 climbed onto trees and rooftops, sprawled out on the grass, and boarded a flotilla of rowboats, canoes, and rafts. Some, like our own Steve Slaton were there to see Zeppelin, others...like Heart's Ann and Nancy Wilson, had come to see Three Dog Night...impressionable and very young Eastside girls, they left early, frightened by Zep's "trouser bulges". City of Seattle engineers were alarmed, and ordered a structural inspection afterward, and though they ordered it condemned, they did allow one more rock show that summer...by the more sedate Grateful Dead and New Riders of the Purple Sage. we know Jimmy Page remembers the show fondly...in 2017 he was in town with his current girlfriend who was reading from her novel at Elliott Bay Books, and was photographed wandering what's left of the grandstands. On the back of what's left of them today is a plaque telling the story of the former theater, noting the Led Zeppelin show, and the fact that "bubblegum music died that day".
It was today in 1970 that the rest of the world got to experience "3 Days of Peace and Music" as the Woodstock soundtrack album was released. It went gold within two weeks, and made big stars of a couple of relative unknowns at the time: Santana and Joe Cocker.
It was today in 1972 that John Lennon made an appearance on The Dick Cavett Show, claiming to be under surveillance by the F.B.I., which he was, placed on the Nixon administration's "enemies list" at the urging of Senator Strom Thurmond for his "anti-American" opposition to the Vietnam War and various other "peacenik" activities.
Tonight in 1974 all four members of Led Zeppelin went to see Elvis Presley at the Forum in L.A. Elvis stopped shortly into his set: "Wait a minute. If we can start together fellas, because we've got Led Zeppelin out there, let's try to look like we know what we're doing". The band met backstage with The King for two hours after the show, with Elvis getting autographs he said "were for his daughter Lisa Marie".
Jamaican singer-songwriter Bob Marley died of cancer and a brain tumor at the age of 36 today in 1981. While it took America a while to catch on, Bob Marley and the Wailers were a huge influence in England, inspiring Eric Clapton's huge hit of a cover of his I Shot the Sheriff, Led Zeppelin's dabble with the reggae beat in D'yer Maker (a play on the English accented pronunciation of "Jamaica"), and Jamaican influenced bands like The Police, The English Beat, The Specials, and Madness. His birthday February 6th is now a national holiday in Jamaica.
Bruce Springsteen was out for his bachelor party just south of Portland tonight in 1985 , two nights before his wedding to model and Lake Oswego native Julianne Phillips. Bruce got fairly liquored up by all accounts, and sang Karaoke-style with a number of songs on the jukebox, some of them his own. They divorced in 1989.
Noel Redding, the bass player of the Jimi Hendrix Experience hand-picked for Jimi by his manager Chas Chandler of the Animals, died at 57 today in 2003.
The June issue of Playboy hit the stands today in 2011, with the cover luring readers inside to see a smokin' hot pictorial with Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall's 27 year old daughter Elizabeth.
Rock and Roll Birthdays
Eric Burdon, #57 on the Rolling Stone Top 100 greatest singers list and member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for his work with The Animals and War is 79 today, and still performing regularly.
Half of the Allman Brothers Band's dual drummer attack, Butch Trucks would be 73 if he hadn't passed in 2017. His nephew, guitarist Derek Trucks, played with them from 1999 until they hung it up in 2014. Butch himself is the nephew of Vigil Trucks, a major league baseball pitcher of the 40's and 50's.