November 16

Births

1938: Troy Seals (Singer for Seals & Croft)

1958: Harry Rushakoff (Drummer for Concrete Blonde)

1962: Gary 'Mani' Mounfield (Bass for The Stone Roses)

1964: Diana Krall (Singer / Songwriter & Pianist)

1966: David Kushner (Rhythm Guitar for Velvet Revolver)

1969: Bryan Abrams (Singer in Color Me Badd)

Events

1955 : Johnny Cash made his 1st chart appearance with "Cry, Cry, Cry".

1965: CBS-TV airs the Frank Sinatra documentary Sinatra: An American Original, hosted by Walter Cronkite.

1965: George Martin puts together the final running order of the songs on the Beatles' Rubber Soul album.

1968: Led Zeppelin played their first ever show in the north of England when they appeared at Manchester College of Science & Technology.

1974: John Lennon was at No.1 in the US singles chart with 'Whatever Gets You Through The Night.' Elton John played on the session and made a deal with Lennon that if the song reached No.1, Lennon would have to appear on stage live with Elton. Lennon kept his side of the deal and appeared live with Elton. They played three songs together: ‘I Saw Her Standing There,’ ‘Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds’ and ‘Whatever Gets You Through the Night.’ Backstage after the concert, Lennon got back with Yoko Ono after a temporary split.

1976: Resident genius of the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, comes out of an eight-year seclusion to give an interview to BBC 2's music show Old Grey Whistle Test.

1978: A musical tribute to the songs of the Beatles starring the Bee Gees, Peter Frampton and dozens of others, the infamous fantasy film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band opens in Us theaters. A notorious flop that was widely panned by critics, the musical does quite a bit of damage to the careers of all who appear in it, including co-stars Alice Cooper, Aerosmith, and Stargard. Comedian Steve Martin, George Burns, and Earth Wind and Fire, however, emerge from the disaster relatively unscathed.

1978: Replicating their infamous promo stunt for the single, Queen are joined onstage at Madison Square Garden by several dozen nude, semi-overweight women during their performance of "Bicycle Race." (Overweight because the single mentions "fat bottomed girls," the title of the other half of the A-side.)

1985: U2 launched their own record label 'Mother Records.'

1987: Former Clash drummer Topper Headon was jailed for 15 months at Maidstone Crown Court, England for supplying heroin to a man who later died.

1987: Actress Lisa Bonet marries singer Lenny Kravitz.  They separated in 1990 and divorced in 1993.

1988: Stan Love, brother and manager of Beach Boy Mike Love, is sentenced to five years' suspended sentence after being found guilty of embezzling over $300,000 from the group.

1996: The Beatles become the first artists to score three Number One albums in the same year when their Anthology 3 hits the top of the American charts.

1998: Having suffered a seizure while performing in Hollywood a few weeks earlier, Roland Alphonso of the Skatalites slips into a coma.

2000: American rapper Joseph (Joe C.) Calleja died of chronic intestinal disorder. Calleja had celiac disease, an autoimmune disorder that can cause stunted growth, as a result, he reached a maximum height of 3 feet, 9 inches (114 centimeters) by adulthood. He was a member of Kid Rock's band.

2001: The city of Palm Springs, CA unveils a statue in its downtown area honoring the late Sonny Bono, half of Sonny and Cher and mayor of the city for a time in the Eighties.

2006: Queen's Greatest Hits is declared the most popular album of all time in Britain, with more than five-and-a-half million units sold. At Number Two: the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper.

2006: The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sends 417 more letters to sixteen college administrators threatening mass lawsuits if file-sharing is found happening on university servers.

November 15

Births

1932: Petula Clark (Pop Singer)

1945: Frida (Anni-Frid Lyngstad) (Blonde in ABBA)

1954: Tony Thompson (Drummer for Chic & The Power Station)

1968: Ol' Dirty Bastard  (Rapper in Wu-Tang Clan & Solo)

1974: Chad Kroeger (Vocals & Guitar in Nickelback)

Events

1956: Elvis Presley's first movie, Love Me Tender, premieres at New York's Paramount Theater. The King's popularity has grown so exponentially large during the filming on the movie that his part -- originally almost a cameo -- is expanded to fit his stardom. Indeed, when his character is killed at the end of the movie, test audiences are so distraught that Elvis re-appears at the end of the movie to reprise the title song. A fifty-foot cardboard cutout of the singer is posted outside the theater to emphasize his new importance to the project, and the movie -- which receives lukewarm reviews from critics who nonetheless appreciate the singer's performance -- rakes in a very respectable four million dollars in just two months.

1964: While on tour, Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones is admitted to Chicago's Passavant Hospital for pneumonia, having reached a temperature of 105. He will miss the last four dates of the Stones' US tour.

1965: The Rolling Stones make their first appearance on NBC-TV's rock variety show Hullabaloo, performing their hit "Get Off Of My Cloud."

1966: The Doors officially signed with Elektra Records in a deal for the band to produce seven albums. The band also reluctantly agreed to release ‘Break On Through’ as their first single. The lyric "She gets high/she gets high/she gets high" was changed to “She gets/she gets/she gets" in order to secure radio play.

1968: Janis Joplin performs her last gig with Big Brother and the Holding Company at New York's Hunter College.

1969: During tonight's Janis Joplin concert in Tampa, FL, a policemen tries to use a bullhorn to control a crowd that had left its seats and begun to move around, prompting Joplin to object: "Don't ---- with those people! Hey, mister, what're you so uptight about? Did you buy a $5 ticket?" The cop responds by telling the singer to inform her crowd that they need to be seated, she replies, "I'm not telling them s---." Janis left the stage after the concert, calling the cop a "son of a b----" and threatening to kick his face in, leading her to be arrested in her dressing room on a charge of publicly using "vulgar and indecent language." After posting a $504 bail, the charges are later dropped.

1969: The Beatles' last photographic session produces today's cover of Rolling Stone. On the same day, obsessive fans looking for "Paul Is Dead" clues on album covers and in songs push two previous Beatles albums, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and Magical Mystery Tour, back onto the Billboard album charts.

1972: Harry Chapin becomes the proud father of his first child, Joshua Burke, in New York City, an event that would eventually inspire him to put his wife's poem, "Cat's In The Cradle," to music.

1975: ABBA were guests on "American Bandstand." They performed "S.O.S." and "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do."

1978: Echo & the Bunnymen made their performance debut in Liverpool, England.

1979: NBC airs The Bee Gees Special, their first, starring Willie Nelson, Glen Campbell, and little brother Andy Gibb.

1990: Milli Vanilli producer Frank Farian held a press conference to confirm the rumours that the two members of the group Rob and Fab had not sung on any of their hit records.

1991: French music producer and songwriter Jacques Morali, died of complications from aids. Formed The Village People and co-produced their film, Can't Stop the Music. Between 1974 and 1982 Morali produced over 65 albums.

1992: Ozzy Osbourne announced his retirement from touring after a gig in California, saying "Who wants to be touring at 46."

1992: The Doors' Robbie Krieger, Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere and the Raiders, Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits, Spencer Davis, Richie Havens, and the Lovin' Spoonful's John Sebastian all guest star on tonight's "Rock Of Ages" episode of FOX's Married With Children.

2000: Michael Abram, the Liverpool native who broke into George Harrison's home and stabbed him in an incident earlier in the year, is found not guilty by reason of insanity at Oxford Crown Court. Abram is ordered confined to a mental hospital for an indefinite period of time.

2004: Shania Twain's "Come On Over" becomes the first country album in history certified for shipments of 20 million units.

2005: Arista releases Carrie Underwood's debut album, "Some Hearts".

2007: Jay-Z went to No.1 on the US album chart with ‘American Gangster’ his 10th No.1 album. This made the rapper joint second with Elvis Presley for the most No.1 albums on the chart; only the Beatles have had more, with 19. Since 1998, all eight of Jay-Z's solo studio albums hade hit No. 1, in addition to his ‘Collision Course’ project with Linkin Park and his ‘Unfinished Business’ collaboration with R. Kelly.

November 14

Births

1947: Buckwheat Zydeco (Zydeco Musician)

1948: James "JY" Young (Guitar & Vocals in Styx)

1951: Stephen Bishop (Singer / Songwriter & Guitarist)

1952: Alec John Such (Bass for Bon Jovi)

1954: Yanni (Keyboardist & Composer)

1964: Joseph 'Run' Simmons (Rapper in Run- DMC)

1968: Brian Yale (Bass for Matchbox Twenty)

1969: Butch Walker (Singer & Guitar in Marvelous 3 and Solo)

1972: Douglas Payne (Bass for Travis)

1974: Adina Howard (R&B Singer)

1975: Travis Barker (Drummer for Blink 182)

Events

1951: Hank Williams makes his first national TV appearance, on CBS-TV's "The Perry Como Show," performing "Hey, Good Lookin'".

1957: The Boston stop on Alan Freed's "Biggest Show Of Stars" concert is the scene of yet another rock and roll "riot" when five audience members are arrested for fighting during a performance by Fats Domino. One audience member, a sailor, is stabbed during the fight.

1964: At the start of her first UK tour, Dusty Springfield causes a furor when she tells a local magazine: "I wish I'd been born colored. When it comes to singing and feeling, I want to be one of them and not me. Then I see how some of them are treated and I thank God I'm white."

1964: Them, the Van Morrison-led band who would later score a hit with the garage-rock classic "Gloria," backs up legendary bluesman Jimmy Reed during a British tour.

1967: Pink Floyd begin their first UK tour at the Royal Albert Hall in London, playing on a package bill with The Move, Nice, Amen Corner, and the headliner, the Jimi Hendrix Experience.

1987: In an initially awkward but eventually moving live event, David Letterman convinces guest Cher to sing "I Got You Babe" just one more time with embittered ex Sonny Bono on his NBC-TV Late Night program. Both Sonny and Cher are left in tears, though no reunion is forthcoming.

1990: This week's issue of Newsweek hits the stands, featuring what seems like a stark admission from the Who's Pete Townshend -- he's bisexual. "I know how it feels to be a woman because I am a woman," he says. "And I won't be classified as just a man." About his song "Rough Boys," which some saw as a gay anthem, he says, "...In a way it was a coming-out. That it was a real acknowledgment of the fact that I'd been surrounded by people that I really adored -- and was actually sexually attracted to -- who were men. And that the side of me that responded to those people was a passive side, a subordinate side."

1990: Record producer Frank Farin fired Milli Vanilli singers Rob Pilatus and Fabrice Morvan because they were insisting on singing on their new album.

1991: Over 1,000 New Kids On The Block fans were given medical treatment after a minor riot during a concert in Berlin, Germany.

1992: John Cascella, keyboardist of John Mellencamp's band, was found dead in his car in Indiana. It is believed that he died of a heart attack.

1996: Michael Jackson married Debbie Rowe in Sydney Australia. The couple had met when he was diagnosed with vitiligo in the mid-1980s, and she was working as his dermatologist's assistant. The couple divorced on October 8, 1999, with Rowe giving full custody rights of the children to Jackson with Rowe receiving an $8-million settlement.

1997: Tonight's Bee Gees show at Vegas' MGM Grand Garden Arena rakes in a record $1,681,100 -- and yet doesn't sell out entirely.

November 13

Births

1933: Clyde McPhatter (Lead Singer in The Drifters)

1951: Bill Gibson (Drums for Huey Lewis and the News)

1953: Andrew Ranken (Drums for The Pogues)

1956: Aldo Nova (Singer & Guitarist)

1979: Nikolai Fraiture (Bass for The Strokes)

Events

1960: Sammy Davis Jr. marries Swedish actress May Britt, one of the first public celebrity interracial marriages.

1967: The Rolling Stones' Brian Jones buys Cotchford Farm, Sussex, England, the former home of Winnie the Pooh writer A.A. Milne. Statues of Pooh characters dot the ground.

1968: The Beatles' Yellow Submarine film premieres in New York.

1969: John Lennon purchases the island Dorinch off the Ireland coast and invites any hippie who wishes to live there.

1973: Jerry Lee Lewis' son Jerry Lee Jr. is killed in a highway accident near Hernando, MS. The elder Lewis had already lost his only other son, Steven Allen, in a 1962 drowning.

1974: An imposter posing as Deep Purple guitar player Ritchie Blackmore crashes a borrowed Porsche in Iowa City, IA, having already conned food and shelter from several Deep Purple fans.

1975: Hank Williams Jr. undergoes four hours of plastic and oral surgery at Nashville's Baptist Hospital to repair damages from a 500-foot fall in an August mountain accident.

1982: Men At Work started a 15-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with their debut album 'Business As Usual', which went on to sell over five million copies in the US.

1985: New York's Whitney Museum presents an exhibition celebrating Bob Dylan's 25 years in the music industry.

1987: Sonny and Cher reunite for a performance on TV show Late Night with David Letterman.

1990: Patricia Boughton filed a lawsuit against Rod Stewart claiming that a football he kicked into the crowd during a concert at Pine Knob Music Theatre had ruptured a tendon in her middle finger. And as a result the injury had made sex between her and her husband difficult.

1992: 90,000 people attend Elton John's Mexico City concert, his first in the country.

2002: The three surviving member of Led Zeppelin announced they were re-forming after 22 years for a US stadium tour.

2004: Rap artist Ol' Dirty Bastard, (real name Russell Jones), collapsed and died at a Manhattan recording studio in New York aged 35. A spokesman for his record company, said the rapper, had complained of chest pains, was dead by the time paramedics reached him. ODB was a founding member of the Wu-Tang Clan in the early 1990s.

2005: Astronauts on at the US space station in orbit around the Earth are woken up today by Paul McCartney, singing "Good Day Sunshine" live from his concert in Anaheim, CA.

November 12

Births

1944: Booker T. Jones (Piano for Booker T. and the MGs)

1945: Neil Young (Singer / Songwriter & Guitarist)

1947: Buck Dharma (Lead Vocals & Guitar for Blue Oyster Cult)

1964: David Ellefson (Bass for Megadeth)

1984: Omarion (Omari Ishmael Grandberry) (R&B Singer in B2K and Solo)

Events

1931: Abbey Road recording studios open in London's pricey St. John's Wood.

1955: Billboard begins its "Top 100" chart, with the first Number One listed as "Love Is A Many-Splendored Thing" by the Four Aces. The magazine wouldn't resolve all its pop charts into one until 1959.

1955: Hill Valley, CA native Marty McFly travels back to this date from 1985 to make sure his parents get together; while in 1955, he plays "Johnny B. Goode" at a local sock hop, inspiring Chuck Berry's "new sound." (Not really.)

1966: Teens on Los Angeles' Sunset Strip protesting a recent curfew are beaten by police, inspiring Stephen Stills to write the Buffalo Springfield hit "For What It's Worth."

1966: The Grateful Dead are the house band at a dance put on by the Hell's Angels biker gang at San Francisco's Sokol Hall.

1966: The Monkees debut album started a 13-week run at No.1 on the US album chart, selling over 3 million copies in three months.

1968: Jimi Hendrix' third album, Electric Ladyland, causes a controversy in England over the cover, which features the singer/guitarist surrounded by a bevy of naked women. A major British chain refuses to stock it; the American version is released with an alternate cover.

1969: The Supremes and the Temptations' second joint TV special, G.I.T. On Broadway, airs on NBC. (The title stands for "Gettin' It Together"; the show consisted of both groups performing show tunes.)

1970: The Doors made their last appearance with Jim Morrison in New Orleans.

1979: Kenny Rogers begins filming the CBS-TV movie The Gambler, based on his 1978 smash tune of the same name. It will spawn four sequels.

1987: Sly Stone arrives one hour late for a major comeback concert in Santa Monica, CA, only to be arrested at the gig for failure to pay child support.

1990: Ron Wood, formerly of the Faces and currently of the Rolling Stones, is badly injured when hit by a car in London, breaking both legs.

1997: Keyboardist and Singer Billy Preston is sentenced to four years in prison in California's Avenal State Prison for cocaine use and fraud when he arranged a fake burglary of his home in 1994. He will serve a year and a half.

1997: Carly Simon is hospitalized with breast cancer, undergoing both chemo and a mastectomy.

1999: Glam legend Gary Glitter is acquitted in England's Bristol Crown Court of sexual assault on a minor stemming from an incident with a fan in the Eighties; however, that same day, Glitter (real name Paul Gadd) is sentenced to four months in jail for four counts of possessing child pornography found in 1997.

2002: The city of Atlanta declared this day as TLC day to remember Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopes who was killed in a car crash on 26th April 2002 aged 30.

2003; Drummer Tony Thompson, who had played drums with Led Zeppelin at Live Aid in 1985, died of cancer. He was most famous as the drummer with Chic, whose single 'Le Freak' hit No.1 in the US. He also played on David Bowie's hit single 'Let's Dance'.

2004: The funeral of longtime (and highly influential) British DJ John Peel is held in Suffolk, England, with attendees including Robert Plant, The White Stripes, and members of Underworld, Pulp, and the Undertones.

2005: Vietnamese authorities visit Gary Glitter's home in Ba Ring Vung Tau and find his live-in companion, a fifteen-year-old girl. The singer, however, has vanished.

2007: Former Culture Club frontman, Boy George was charged with the false imprisonment of a 28-year-old man. Police said the offence was alleged to have taken place at the 47-year-old's home in Hackney, in London on 28 April of this year.

2008: Mitch Mitchell, the British drummer with the Jimi Hendrix Experience, was found dead in his US hotel room at age 61. Mitchell had been working with Georgie Fame & the Blue Flames when in 1966 he was invited to audition for a new band being formed to back Jimi Hendrix. During the 70's Mitchell failed an audition for Paul McCartney's new band, Wings.

November 11

Births

1929: LaVern Baker (R&B Singer)

1945: Vince Martell (Lead Guitar for Vanilla Fudge)

1945: Chris Dreja (Rhythm Guitar & Bass for The Yardbirds)

1950: Jim Peterik (Lead Vocals & Guitar for Survivor)

1953: Andy Partridge (Singer / Songwriter & Guitarist for XTC)

Events

1944: Frank Sinatra, late of the Harry James big band, signs with Columbia as a solo recording artist.

1963: After a gig in Birmingham, England, the Beatles find themselves attempting to escape a throng of fanatically devoted fans for the first time, escaping through the crowd by dressing up as policemen.

1965: Journalist Al Aronowitz gets the garage band The Velvet Underground their first gig -- at the Summit High School dance in Summit, NJ.

1967: Van Morrison makes his only appearance on ABC-TV's American Bandstand, lip-synching his big hit, "Brown Eyed Girl."

1968: American record buyers are scandalized when John Lennon and Yoko Ono release their new album Unfinished Music No.1: Two Virgins with a cover depicting the two of them standing unashamedly in full-frontal nudity. Record stores eventually carry the experimental album in a brown paper wrapper.

1969: Jim Morrison of the Doors is arrested by the FBI for drunk and disorderly behavior and interfering with the flight of an aircraft in Phoenix, AZ, after a flight attendant on his trip from Los Angeles accuses him of attacking and sexually harassing her. Morrison and his flight companion, American actor Tom Baker, spend the night in local jail but are released the next day on $2,500 bail. The charges are later dropped.

1970: Ringo Starr and his first wife, Maureen, become the proud parents of their first child, daughter Lee Parkin, at Queen Charlotte's Maternity Hospital in Hammersmith, London.

1970: Bob Dylan publishes his first novel, a poorly-received stream-of-consciousness work called Tarantula.

1972: Berry Oakley (Bass for Allman Brothers) was involved in a motorcycle accident in Macon, Georgia, just three blocks from where Duane Allman had his fatal motorcycle accident the year before.  He refused medical treatment and got a ride home.  Three hours later, he was rushed to the hospital, delirious and in pain, and died of cerebral swelling caused by a fractured skull.  He was 24 years old.

1975: Reba McEntire signs her first recording contract, with Mercury Records.

1986: Pink Floyd announce their intention to record a new album and tour under their band name, a name which recently departed leader Roger Waters considers his alone.

1990: A 21 year-old AC/DC fan died after being attacked outside the Brendan Byrne Arena in New Jersey where the band were playing a gig that night.

1994: Christie's auction house in New York City holds their first-ever auction of rock memorabilia, including the Beach Boys' guitars, a stage outfit worn by Jimi Hendrix, and John Lennon's famous Army fatigues.

1994: The Monkees' Micky Dolenz guest stars, along with Rick Neilsen of Cheap Trick and Billy Vera, on tonight's "" episode of ABC-TV's Boy Meets World.

1999: Singer Brandy was admitted into a hospital in Southern California due to dehydration from overwork.

2000: The original Meters reunite for one and only one gig in San Francisco, their first since 1977.

2003: A London High Court orders Van Morrison to pay $67,000 in lost revenue to Gary Marlow, owner of the Crown Hotel in Wiltshire, England, after canceling a planned gig there.

2004: M'hammed Soumayah, bodyguard for Liza Minelli, sues ths singer for $100 million for allegedly forcing him to have sex with her or be fired.

2004: Coldplay fan Sarah Sainsbury wrote to the band asking for their autographs so she could sell them to raise funds at her school charity. Coldplay sent her a triple platinum disc worth over $7,500. 

November 10

Births

1947: Glen Buxton (Guitar for Alice Cooper)

1948: Greg Lake (Vocals & Bass for King Crimson & Emerson, Lake and Palmer)

1966: Steve Mackey (Bass for Pulp)

1967: Mushroom (Andrew Vowles) (Massive Attack)

1970: Warren G (Warren Griffin)

1975: Jim Adkins (Lead Singer and Guitarist with Jimmy Eat World)

1978: Eve (Eve Jihan Jeffers) Rapper

1979: Chris Joannou (Bass for Silverchair)

1983: Miranda Lambert (Country Artist)

Events

1955: In his Nashville hotel room, songwriter Mae Axton plays Elvis Presley a demo of a song she's co-written called "Heartbreak Hotel."

1958: Sam Cooke and Lou Rawls, then a member of Cooke's backup band, are badly injured in a car crash in Marion, AR, while touring with the gospel group the Pilgrim Travellers. Rawls is hurt so badly he is actually pronounced dead at the scene; chauffeur Edward Cunningham, however, is the only actual casualty.

1966: British newspapers break the news that the Beatles will indeed refuse all future offers to tour.

1967: The Beatles film three separate videos for their new single, "Hello Goodbye," at London's Saville Theatre. The three are eventually edited together to form one video, but the BBC, which has just given in to a Musician's Union ban on lip-syncing, refuses to air the clip.

1970: Martha Reeves of the Vandellas gives birth to her first and only son, Eric.

1984: Former Rufus singer Chaka Khan was at No.1 on the singles chart with 'I Feel For You.' Written by Prince, the song featured Stevie Wonder on harmonica and the Rap was by Grandmaster Melle Mel. The repetition of Khan's name by rapper Melle Mel at the beginning of the song was originally a mistake made by producer Arif Mardin, who then decided to keep it.

1994: Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page and Robert Plant perform an all-acoustic version of "Stairway To Heaven" while visiting a Japanese talk show.

1997: American session guitarist Tommy Tedesco died of lung cancer aged 67. Described by "Guitar Player" magazine as the most recorded guitarist in history recording with The Beach Boys, Everly Brothers, The Supremes, The Monkees, The Association, Barbra Streisand, Elvis Presley, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Zappa, Sam Cooke, Cher, and Nancy and Frank Sinatra. And played on many TV themes including Bonanza, The Twilight Zone, M*A*S*H and Batman.

2002: On tonight's "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" episode of FOX-TV's The Simpsons, guest stars Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Tom Petty, Elvis Costello, Lenny Kravitz, and Brian Setzer operate a rock and roll fantasy camp.

2003: David Bowie is forced to cancel the remainder of his concert in Nice, France, when laryngitis causes his voice to go out completely in the middle of "Ziggy Stardust."