1967 - Aretha Franklin went to No. 1 with her cover of the Otis Redding hit "Respect." Otis Redding wrote this and originally recorded it in 1965. Redding said of Aretha's version shortly before his death in 1967: "That's one of my favorite songs because it has a better groove than any of my records." It was Aretha's idea to cover this song. She came up with the arrangement, added the "sock it to me" lines, and played piano on the track. Her sister Carolyn, who sang backup on the album, also helped work up the song.
1967 - "It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty delta day," as Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge, according to the Bobbie Gentry song, "Ode To Billie Joe." In this song, a family finds out about the death of Billie Joe and shares gossip about him at the dinner table along with their other mundane concerns. Bobbie Gentry explained: "The message of the song revolves around the nonchalant way the family talks about the suicide. The song is a study in unconscious cruelty."
1970 - The Kinks' Ray Davies was forced to make a 6,000-mile round trip from New York to London and back again -- interrupting the band's American tour -- to change one word in a recording of the song, "Lola." In the original recording, Davies had used the word name "Coca-Cola" in the lyrics, but BBC Radio refused to play the song because singing "Coca-Cola" could be seen as product placement, a violation of the BBC Charter forbidding advertising or sponsored programs. Davies thus changed the name "Coca-Cola" to the generic "cherry cola" for the song's single release, thereby adhering to BBC guidelines. (Photo credit BEN STANSALL/AFP/GettyImages)
1972 - The Staple Singers' "I'll Take You There" hit No. 1 as the group made a successful transition from gospel to secular music. Many elements of this song, including the famous intro, were based on a Jamaican instrumental song called "The Liquidator" by the Harry J Allstars.
1972 - Jethro Tull's concept album Thick As A Brick, complete with an insert from the fictional newspaper St. Cleve Chronicle and Linwell Advertiser, hits #1 in America. The entire album consists of the song "Thick as a Brick." The album chronicles the adventures of Gerald Bostock, a young prodigy who decides to follow in his father's footsteps and become a soldier instead of following his passion for art.
1977 - Bob Marley & the Wailers released Exodus. In the wake of the assassination attempt, Marley and his band left Jamaica and settled in London for two years, where he recorded the album. Exodus featured the hits, 'Jamming', 'Waiting In Vain', 'Three Little Birds' and 'One Love', tunes that defined Marley's gift for sounding laid-back and incisive at once. In 1999, Time magazine named Exodus the best album of the 20th century.
1991 - In an effort to pay off his tax debt, Willie Nelson releases Who'll Buy My Memories: The IRS Tapes. Available by mail order at (800) IRS-TAPE, it's part of a deal Nelson made with the IRS to help reconcile his whopping $32 million tax bill.
Birthdays:
Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, who appeared in the film for Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues," was born on this date in 1926.
Drummer Mickey Finn (T. Rex) was born on this day in 1947.
Curtis Mayfield was born today in 1942. As the leader of the Impressions, he recorded some of the finest soul vocal group music of the 1960s. As a solo artist in the 1970s, he helped pioneer funk and helped introduce hard-hitting urban commentary into soul music. "Gypsy Woman," "It's All Right," "People Get Ready," "Freddie's Dead," and "Super Fly" are merely the most famous of his many hit records.
Ian Hunter is 82. He is best-known as the lead singer of Mott The Hoople - famous for the song "All the Young Dudes", written for them by David Bowie and appearing on their 1972 album of the same name. His best-known solo works are "Once Bitten, Twice Shy", later covered by Great White, and "Cleveland Rocks", which The Presidents of the United States of America covered and was used as the theme song for The Drew Carey Show.
Suzi Quatro, female rock icon, is 71.
Republica vocalist Samantha Sprackling, aka Saffron, is 53.
On This Day In Music History is sourced from This Day in Music, Allmusic, Song Facts and Wikipedia.