The Beatles were on the last day of train scenes for their first movie A Hard Day's Night today in 1964. In six days they racked up over 2500 miles on the British Railway System, but more importantly George Harrison met his (and his friend Eric Clapton's) future wife, Pattie Boyd. She was a fashion model cast as a "star-struck schoolgirl", and been "semi-engaged" to a photographer, and recalled later that George's first words to her "Will you marry me? Well, if you won't marry me will you at least have dinner with me?" She turned him down then, but dumped the photographer the second time George asked.
Capitol Records released a single by The Four Preps today in 1964 called Letter To The Beatles, in which a boy not necessarily a photographer lamented that he'd lost a girlfriend to the lads from Liverpool. It entered the charts at #85 that day, but they'd tried to make it a bit more authentic by including a few bars of I Want to Hold Your Hand without permission, and Capitol pulled the single to avoid a lawsuit.
Pink Floyd played London's prestigious Marquee Club tonight in 1967 when they were spotted by Peter Jenner, a 21 year old lecturer at the London School of Economics. He decided then and there that though he knew nothing about the music business, that was what he wanted to do. Floyd were still playing mostly R&B covers at the time, but Jenner was impressed by the sonic experimentation that was just starting to go on between Syd Barrett and Rick Wright, so he followed Nick Mason and Roger Waters home to the flat they shared, and proposed that he and his wealthy friend Andrew King manage the band, immediately buying them new instruments and a P.A. system. He would go on to manage not only Pink Floyd, but T Rex, Ian Dury and the Blockheads, Roy Harper, The Clash, The Disposable Heroes of Hiphopricy, The Soft Boys (and later their frontman Robyn Hitchcock), and Billy Bragg, and also put on a number of free concerts at London's Hyde Park, including a rather famous one by The Rolling Stones.
Having just changed the name of their band Earth, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, Bill Ward, and Ozzy Osbourne played for the first time as Black Sabbath tonight in 1970 at The Roundhouse in London.
Though they didn't record their show there as The Who had a year earlier, Led Zeppelin played live in the refectory (cafeteria) at the University of Leeds tonight in 1971. They were just beginning to do songs from what would be their fourth album, including Stairway to Heaven, Black Dog, and Going to California.
CBS TV aired the 12th and final installment of The Jacksons variety show tonight in 1977, with guests comedians Tim Conway and David Letterman. It finished it's run dead last in the ratings.
An unknown new band called The Honeydrippers played at the University of Keele in Staffordshire England tonight in 1981, taking great care to not let the public know their lead singer was Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin.
Columbia Records released Just Another Night, the debut single from Mick Jagger's first solo album She's The Boss today in 1985. Keith Richards wasn't the only one who hated it. Mick would be sued three years later by a Jamaican reggae singer living in New York, Patrick Alley, who claimed Mick had taken the title from his song of the same name, but a jury ruled in favor of Jagger.
Tom Jones was officially banned from wearing tight leather pants by his manager, who also happened to be his son Mark Jones, today in 2004. Mark said it was time for his father to start dressing his age, as he was in danger of becoming a laughingstock at age 63.
Molly Hatchett's original lead singer Danny Joe Brown died of complications of diabetes today in 2005 at age 53.
Boston lead singer Brad Delp was found in the master bathroom of his house today in 2007, dead at age 55 of carbon monoxide poisoning from the two charcoal grills he'd lit after sealing the room with tape. A note left on the pillow he'd laid on read "Mr. Brad Delp. Jai une ame salitaire. I am a lonely soul." The police officers who found him already expected the worst, they'd found two other notes left by the ever-polite but obviously depressed Delp: one in the garage where they found a hose from his car's exhaust pipe to the interior reading "To whoever finds this I have hopefully committed suicide. Plan B was to asphyxiate myself in my car", and another at the top of the stairs warning them of the presence of CO in the bathroom.
Rock and Roll Birthdays
Velvet Underground multi-instrumentalist and songwriter John Cale (OBE) is 78.
Paul Revere and the Raiders lead singer Mark Lindsay is 78.
Procul Harum and solo guitarist Robin Trower is 75.
Manfred Mann's Earth Band singer Chris Thompson is 72.
Trevor Burton, guitarist with The Move, is 71.
Frankie Rodriguez, who just 14 years old when he played keyboards on ? and the Mysterians one hit 96 Tears, is 69.