1971 - Grace Slick and Paul Kantner of Jefferson Airplane become the proud parents of a baby girl. They originally wanted to name the child God, but after a storm of controversy, settled on China.
1975 - A year and a half after its initial release, Lynyrd Skynyrd peaked at number 19 on the chart with "Free Bird", which became the band's anthem. And would be yelled out at every other concert for years to come, no matter who was on stage.
1978 - Joy Division made their live debut when they played Pips in Manchester, England. Originally named Warsaw (after the Bowie song), the band was lead by Ian Curtis, who suffered from epilepsy and had trouble performing live, grew increasingly depressed over the band's few active years and took his own life the night before their first American tour, at the age of 23. The remaining members carried on as New Order.
1980 - Paul McCartney is released and deported from Japan (he was there for an 11 day tour with Wings) after spending nine days in a Tokyo jail. He was arrested at the airport when customs officials found a half a pound of marijuana in his luggage.
In an interview, Sir Paul offered this explanation: “We were about to fly to Japan and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get anything to smoke over there,” McCartney said in 2004. “This stuff was too good to flush down the toilet, so I thought I’d take it with me.” (Photo by Jo Hale/Getty Images)
1985 - Prince releases "Take Me With U," the last single from Purple Rain. It was originally supposed to be performed by in the movie by Vanity, but she pulled out of filming after being offered a lucrative Motown contract. It was then given to Apollonia 6 for their debut, but Prince eventually took it back for the Purple Rain. Apollonia 6 were OK with that move, but were really disappointed when he took "Manic Monday" away from them and gave it to The Bangles.
2011 - A former Miss Canada finalist became the first person in the world to graduate with a Masters degree in The Beatles. The course taught at Liverpool Hope University, looked at the studio sound and composition of The Beatles and how Liverpool helped to shape their music as well as examining the significance of the music of The Beatles and their impact on Western culture.
2021 - The Rolling Stones introduced a pair of candy bars called Brown Sugar and Cherry Red a nod to the 1969 Stones single “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” that features the lyric, “My favorite flavor, cherry red.”) to their line-up of band endorsed, on-line merchandise. "Always take candy from strangers..."
Birthdays:
Etta James was born in 1938. Few female R&B stars enjoyed the kind of consistent acclaim Etta James received throughout a career that spanned six decades; the celebrated producer Jerry Wexler once called her "the greatest of all modern blues singers," and she recorded a number of enduring hits, including "At Last," "Tell Mama," "I'd Rather Go Blind". She lived a rough-and-tumble life that could have inspired a dozen soap operas, battling drug addiction and bad relationships while outrunning a variety of health and legal problems. In 2008 she was played onscreen by Beyoncé in Cadillac Records, a film loosely based on the history of Chess Records.
On This Day In Music History was sourced from This Day in Music, Song Facts, Diffuser, Allmusic, and Wikipedia.