1967 - The Beatles filmed part of the promo clip for 'Penny Lane' around the Royal Theatre, Stratford, London and walking up and down Angel Lane in London. Together with the video for 'Strawberry Fields Forever', this was one of the first examples of what later became known as a music video.
1972 - Paul Simon released his first new song without Art Garfunkel, "Mother and Child Reunion". Simon got the idea for the reggae-infused song title from a chicken-and-egg dish that he saw on a Chinese restaurant's menu.
Explaining the meaning behind the lyrics shortly after the release of ‘Mother and Child Reunion’, he began by explaining that, until very recently, his life had been untouched by death: “Last summer we had a dog that was run over and killed, and we loved this dog.”
“It was the first death I had ever experienced personally,” Simon continued. “Nobody in my family died that I felt that. But I felt this loss – one minute there, the next minute gone..."
1973 - Elton John's "Crocodile Rock" becomes his first US number one hit. The falsetto hook from Pat Boone's 1962 hit, "Speedy Gonzales" has some similar "la la"s, and Elton has copped to the influence, saying "Crocodile Rock" was "a really blatant homage to 'Speedy Gonzales' and all the great '50s and '60s records that we used to love."
2006 - The Rolling Stones played three songs during the half-time show of The Super Bowl in Detroit. After the event, the Stones expressed their displeasure over having Mick Jagger's microphone turned down during the song "Start Me Up". The line "you make a dead man come" was cut short and a barnyard reference to "cocks" in the new song "Rough Justice" also disappeared.
2016 - A new species of black tarantula that lives near Folsom Prison, California, was named after Johnny Cash. Aphonopelma johnnycashi was among 14 new tarantula species from the southern U.S. which were described by biologists in the journal ZooKeys.
Birthdays:
William S. Burroughs was born on this day in 1914. Widely considered a primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodern author who influenced popular culture and literature, he also had a presence in music. He has collaborated with R.E.M. (“Star Me Kitten”), Sonic Youth, Laurie Anderson, Nick Cave, Tom Waits, and Throbbing Gristle, Kurt Cobain, and appears in U2’s music video for “Last Night on Earth.”
Hal Blaine, session musician with the Wrecking Crew, was born on this day in 1929. Brian Wilson called him, "the greatest drummer ever". His résumé includes tens of thousands of recording dates and hundreds of hits.
Some of his best moments:
The 5th Dimension, “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In” (1969)
Simon & Garfunkel, “A Hazy Shade of Winter” (1966)
The Ronettes, “Be My Baby (1963)
The Beach Boys, “Good Vibrations” (1966)
America, “Ventura Highway (1972)
The Byrds, ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ (1965)
Barrett Strong was born on this day in 1941. He was the first artist to record a hit for Motown, "Money (That's What I Want)" which was famously covered by The Beatles and others, but he was mainly known for his songwriting skills as he contributed to the writing of many hits including "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" by both Marvin Gaye and Gladys Knight & the Pips; "War" by Edwin Starr; ; "Smiling Faces Sometimes" by the Undisputed Truth; and the long line of "psychedelic soul" records by the Temptations, including "Cloud Nine", "I Can't Get Next to You", "Psychedelic Shack", "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)", and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone", among others.
Al Kooper — who started Blood, Sweat & Tears, and did session work on Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” (organ), the Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” (French horn and piano), the Who, Jimi Hendrix, B.B. King, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Roy Orbison, and many more — is 80.
Christopher Guest, actor, director, writer and musician — known for his work as guitarist Nigel Tufnel in This is Spinal Tap ("These go to eleven," watch below) and as Alan Barrows of the fictional folk trio The Folksmen is 76. (Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)
Chris Barron of The Spin Doctors is 56. Born in Hawaii, then moves with his family to Australia at age 8, then to Princeton, New Jersey at 12, where he goes to high school with John Popper of Blues Traveler.
R.I.P.:
2012 - American record producer and session musician Al De Lory died at age 82. In the early Sixties De Lory played keyboards for various Phil Spector productions, and The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds. As producer worldwide hits by Glen Campbell, "Gentle on My Mind", "By the Time I Get to Phoenix", "Wichita Lineman" and "Galveston". He was also a member of the Los Angeles session musicians known as The Wrecking Crew. As a bandleader he had his own hit in 1970 with an instrumental version of the "Song from M*A*S*H".
On This Day In Music History was sourced, copied, pasted, edited, and occasionally woven together with my own crude prose, from This Day in Music, Far Out Magazine, Rolling Stone, Song Facts and Wikipedia.