The Beatles spent today in 1964 at Twickenham Film Studios in London on a sound-stage made up to look like the interior of a train baggage car working on their forthcoming movie A Hard Day's Night. They mimed to a recording of I Should Have Known Better and played cards while some "schoolgirls" looked on dreamily through the cage. One of them, fashion model Pattie Boyd, instantly caught the eye of George Harrison, who immediately asked her "Will you marry me? Well, if you won't marry me, will you have dinner with me tonight?" Pattie was at the time engaged to her photographer boyfriend and turned him down, but George persisted, she ended the engagement, and within a few days was on a date with him...chaperoned by Brian Epstein. They'd be married 18 months later. Pattie would turn all the Beatles on to the Maharishi, was with George when a dentist friend turned them on to LSD (without telling them), but their marriage would flame out in '73 when George started doing the nose candy. After a brief affair with Ronnie Wood of The Faces, she would hook up with and marry George's friend Eric Clapton, who'd been pining for her for years (see Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs) from '79-'84.
Music publisher Dick James reported today in 1967 that so far, 446 recorded covers of Paul McCartney's song Yesterday had been licensed and recorded. Today that number stands at around 2,200, making it the most-covered song of all time.
Crosby, Stills, and Nash released their second album today in 1970. The music press were eager with anticipation for Déjà Vu as they had added Stephen Stills' old Buffalo Springfield bandmate Neil Young to their lineup. Other players who got their names in much smaller print included drummer Dallas Taylor, who'd played on the first CSN record, and fake I.D. toting 16 year old bass player Greg Reeves. Also appearing were The Lovin' Spoonful's John Sebastian on harmonica and The Grateful Dead's Jerry Garcia on pedal steel guitar. Neil had played with CSN at Woodstock, but was rude to a cameraman, and got himself edited out of the movie version.
The Doors frontman Jim Morrison joined his girlfriend Pamela Courson in Paris today in 1971. The two lived in a hotel for a week before finding an apartment. On July 3rd Pam would find Jim dead in the apartment's bathtub at age 27.
American singer Harry Nilsson was at #1 in England today in 1972 with Without You, a cover of a song he'd heard at a party and thought was a new Beatles song. He was close...It had been on the Beatles Apple Corps label as written and recorded by Pete Ham and Tom Evans of Badfinger.
The Clash headlined The Roxy Club in London tonight in 1977 in a show most notable in that the opening band was the first performance of the world's first all-female punk rock band The Slits.
Van Halen started a 131-date tour in support of their 10th studio album (and last with Sammy Hagar on vocals) Balance tonight in 1995 in Pensacola Florida. Eddie Van Halen would jokingly rename it the "Ambulance" tour as he was recovering from hip surgery, and his brother Alex had to play drums for many of the shows wearing a neck brace.
Ali Mubarrat, the current owner of a house in Birmingham England, put it's front door up for sale on eBay today in 2005 because he was sick to death of Ozzy Osbourne fans showing up and defacing it just because the Black Sabbath singer had lived there as a child, and over the years it had become a pilgrimage site. Ali donated the proceeds to charity.
In a decision that still leaves many scratching their heads wondering "WTF?", The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted Madonna tonight in 2008 in a star-studded ceremony at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York. Making her induction speech was another guy actual rock and roll fans thought "Why is he here?" about was Justin Timberlake, but the rock hall did get some things right that year, also inducting John "Never ever call me Cougar again" Mellencamp, the late Canadian singer Leonard Cohen, London rock band The Dave Clark Five, and Tacoma's surf guitar instrumental kings The Ventures.
Rock and Roll Birthdays
Mark Stein, keyboard player and singer with Vanilla Fudge is 73, and forever a part of Seattle history. Most people credit Led Zeppelin with the famous "Mudshark" or "Red Snapper" incident at the Edgewater Inn, but Zeppelin were opening for Vanilla Fudge at the Seattle Center Arena that night, and members of both bands were fully involved.
Golden Earring founder and guitarist George Kooymans is 72.