March 25

Birthdays

1934: Johnny Burnette (Rockabilly Artist)

1938: Hoyt Axton (Singer)

1940: Anita Bryant (Singer)

1942: Aretha Franklin (Singer)

1947: Elton John (Singer)

1947: Jack Hall (The Charlie Daniels Band)

1951: Maisie Williams (Singer in Boney M)

1952: Paul Miles (Blues Guitarist)

1960: Steve Norman (Guitar & Sax for Spandau Ballet)

1966: Jeff Healey (Singer & Guitarist)

1969: Cathy Dennis (Singer)

1971: Michael McKeegan (Bass for Therapy?)

1975: Juvenile (Terry Gray)

Events

1958: Reporting to Ft. Chaffee, AK by bus for his induction into the service, Elvis Presley has his famous hair shorn off by an Army barber. The media follows close behind. The pop icon is assigned to Second Medium Tank Battalion, Second Armored Division, the "Hell On Wheels" division once led by General George S. Patton. Elvis, however, receives an assignment as a jeep driver. Within days, manager "Colonel" Tom Parker receives 5,000 pieces of mail addressed to the singer at Fort Chaffee.

1960: Ray Charles recorded "Georgia On My Mind".

1960: Roy Orbison recorded "Only The Lonely".

1961: Elvis Presley holds an afternoon press conference and, in the evening, performs the USS Arizona concert at Pearl Harbor's Bloch Arena, raising $62,000 for the memorial dedicated to the 1,177 US servicemen killed when the ship went down on December 7, 1941. This would be Presley's last live performance for seven years.

1964: The Beatles made their debut on UK TV show 'Top Of The Pops' singing 'Can't Buy Me Love' and ‘You Can’t Do That.’ The show had been recorded on March 19th.

1965: London session guitarist Jeff Beck joins the Yardbirds after being recommended by the group's first choice, another session man named Jimmy Page (Led Zepplin).

1966: At a photo session with Bob Whitaker’s studio in London, The Beatles posed in white coats using sides of meat with mutilated and butchered dolls for the cover of their next American album, ‘Yesterday and Today’. After a public outcry, the L.P. was pulled from stores and re-issued with a new cover.

1967: The Who and Cream made their U.S. concert debut at RKO 58th Street Theatre, New York City as part of a rock & roll extravaganza promoted by DJ Murray the K.

1968: Roy Orbison marries his second wife, Barbara Wellhonen, in Nashville. They would remain married until Orbison's death twenty years later.

1968: "The Frodis Caper," the 58th and last episode of The Monkees, directed by Micky Dolenz and featuring the lone band song "Zor and Zam," airs on NBC-TV.

1969: A just-married John Lennon and Yoko Ono decide to use the press circus of their honeymoon to promote an end to the Vietnam war, and wars in general. The duo stay, fully clothed, in their bed at the Amsterdam Hilton for the next four days, talking about peace to a cadre of largely skeptical reporters from around the world.

1971: New York's flagship radio station WNBC becomes the first to ban Brewer and Shipley's hit "One Toke Over The Line" due to alleged marijuana references.

1972: America started a three week run at No.1 on the singles chart with their debut hit 'Horse With No Name'.

1976: Jackson Browne's wife, Phyllis Major, commits suicide with sleeping pills just months after their marriage, leading the singer-songwriter to spend much of his next record, The Pretender, dealing with the tragedy.

1977: Elvis Costello released his debut single 'Less Than Zero' it didn't make the Top 40.

1978: Bill Kenny (The Ink Spots) dies.

1979:  Van Halen released the album "Van Halen II."

1983: Motown tapes an all-star concert at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium in Pasadena, California in order to celebrate the label's anniversary. Performers include Stevie Wonder, The Four Tops, The Temptations, Smokey Robinson, The Commodores, Martha Reeves, and Jr. Walker. Also appearing, in what would be his last TV performance, is Marvin Gaye. A very brief Supremes reunion and a Jackson 5 performance top off the night, but when the show is broadcast on May 16, 1983, it is Michael Jackson's solo performance of his new single "Billie Jean" -- complete with moonwalk -- that would steal the show, kicking off the Thriller juggernaut and turning Michael from a superstar to a megastar overnight.

1985: Stevie Wonder wins his first Oscar for his theme to the film The Woman In Red, entitled "I Just Called To Say I Love You." Sixteen years later to the day, Bob Dylan will win his first Oscar for his Wonder Boys song "Things Have Changed."

1985:  Prince won an Oscar for Best Original Score for the soundtrack for the movie "Purple Rain."

1986: Guns N' Roses signed a world-wide deal with Geffen Records.

1989: The recording studio at Chuck Berry's ranch in Wentzville, MO is destroyed by a fire, taking with it 13 of Berry's unreleased songs.

1990: Motley Crue's Tommy Lee was arrested for mooning at the audience during a gig in Augusta. Lee was charged with indecent exposure.

1995: Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder was rescued after a riptide carried him 250 feet offshore in New Zealand.

2000: Former Bay City Rollers drummer Derek Longmuir was given 300 hours community service after being caught with a hoard of child pornography including 150 videos and 73 floppy disks.

2000: N’SYNC set a new world record after selling a million tickets in one day for the group’s forthcoming tour, netting them over 42.5 million.

2001: The first Britney Spears Pepsi TV commercial was aired on US television. Spears had signed a multi-million dollar deal with Pepsi for her forthcoming world tour.

2002: Joe Schermie (Three Dog Night) died of a heart attack at age 52.

2002: Bono from U2 made a appearance at the air rage trial of R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck, telling the court 'I came to court because Peter is actually famously know for being a peaceable person. I once had to twist his arm to get him to a boxing match'. Buck was later cleared of all charges. He had been accused of attacking two cabin staff and covering them in yoghurt, knocking over a trolley and trying to steal a knife.

2002: The seven-year mystery of missing Manic Street Preachers guitarist Richey Edwards took a grisly twist when human feet were found near where he vanished in 1995.

2003: Liv Tyler the daughter of Aerosmith singer Steven married Royston Langdon from Spacehog.

2004 - In Georgia, the House of Representatives voted 134-0 to name a stretch of Interstate 85 for country music star Alan Jackson. The honor had already passed the Senate.

2005: Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne were forced to flee their Buckinghamshire mansion after a blaze broke out as they slept. Ozzy and his wife were roused by a fire alarm and ran to safety in the garden, rescuing their pets as they escaped.

2006: Buck Owens  died in his sleep of an apparent heart attack only hours after performing at his Crystal Palace restaurant, club and museum in Bakersfield.

2008: Richie Sambora was arrested in California on suspicion of drink driving. The 48 year-old Bon Jovi guitarist was arrested after a police officer noticed his black Hummer weaving in traffic lanes in Laguna Beach. He was ordered to appear in court on one count of driving under the influence.

2009: Dan Seals (England Dan and John Ford Coley) dies of complications from a stem cell transplant he had the previous December.