1967 - John Lennon recorded his backing vocals for "Good Morning Good Morning" at Abbey Road Studios in London, and Paul McCartney added a lead guitar solo to the Sgt. Pepper’s track. Lennon had decided he wanted to end the song with animal sound effects, and asked that they be sequenced in such a way that each successive animal was capable of scaring or eating the preceding one.
1967 - Van Morrison recorded Brown Eyed Girl.
Originally titled "Brown-Skinned Girl". Morrison remarked on the title change: "That was just a mistake. It was a kind of Jamaican song. Calypso. It just slipped my mind [that] I changed the title." "After we'd recorded it, I looked at the tape box and didn't even notice that I'd changed the title. I looked at the box where I'd lain it down with my guitar and it said 'Brown Eyed Girl' on the tape box. It's just one of those things that happen."
1968 - Otis Redding's "(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay" hit No. 1 about three months after his death, becoming the first-ever posthumous No. 1 hit.
1973 - Led Zeppelin released their fifth studio album, Houses of the Holy. Looser and more relaxed than IV, Jimmy Page's riffs rely on ringing, folky hooks as much as they do on thundering blues-rock, giving the album a lighter, more open atmosphere. While the pseudo-reggae of "D'Yer Mak'er" and the affectionate James Brown send-up "The Crunge" suggest that the band was searching for material, they actually contribute to the musical diversity of the album. "The Rain Song" is one of Zep's finest moments and "The Ocean" is just as good, starting with a heavy, funky guitar, an a cappella section and ending with a swinging, doo wop-flavored rave-up. Throughout the record, the band's playing is excellent, making the eclecticism of Page and Robert Plant's songwriting sound coherent and natural. (Photo by Don EMMERT / AFP) (Photo by DON EMMERT/AFP via Getty Images)
1975 - At an Elvis Presley concert at the Hilton in Las Vegas, Barbra Streisand goes backstage and offers Elvis the lead role in her upcoming film A Star Is Born. Elvis is interested, but on the advice of his manager Colonel Parker, he demands too much money and top billing, so Kris Kristofferson is chosen for the role instead.
1995 - Wilco’s debut studio album, A.M. is released. It's by far the one with the closest resemblance to Jeff Tweedy's prior band, Uncle Tupelo. It's all but impossible to imagine Uncle Tupelo kicking up their heels with numbers like "I Must Be High," "Casino Queen," or "Box Full of Letters," and the interplay between the musicians feels playful and easygoing. A.M. sounds like the point where Jeff Tweedy and his collaborators let go of Uncle Tupelo and took a bold, smart step into their future.
2014 - Tickets for Kate Bush first live shows in 35 years sold out in less than 15 minutes.
R.I.P.:
1974 - Delta blues singer and guitarist Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup died at the age of 69. He may well have been Elvis Presley's favorite bluesman recording no less than three of "Big Boy's" Victor classics during his seminal rockabilly heyday: "That's All Right Mama" (Elvis' Sun debut in 1954), "So Glad You're Mine," and "My Baby Left Me." Often lost in all the hubbub surrounding Presley's classic covers are Crudup's own contributions to the blues lexicon. He didn't sound much like anyone else, and that makes him an innovator, albeit a rather rudimentary guitarist (he didn't even pick up the instrument until he was 30 years old).
He was playing on the streets of Chicago and living in a packing crate underneath an elevated train track when he was discovered and eventually got a record contract.
2012 - Earl Scruggs passed away. As part of the Foggy Mountain Boys and later Flatt & Scruggs (both with Lester Flatt), he created the sound of bluegrass and helped bring it to national recognition. During the '40s, the group added "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" to the bluegrass canon, and during the '50s and '60s, they became the most visible bluegrass act in the country. The duo recorded the theme song to the television sitcom The Beverly Hillbilles. The theme, called "The Ballad of Jed Clampett," became the first number one bluegrass single in early 1963.
On This Day In Music History was sourced, copied, pasted, curated, edited, and occasionally woven together with my own crude prose, from This Day in Music, Music This Day, Allmusic, Song Facts and Wikipedia.
KBCO