14
Featured Events
2014Pop singer Kesha files a civil lawsuit against her longtime producer, Dr. Luke (Lukasz Gottwald), in a bid to be released from her contract. She cites years of physical, verbal, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of the producer, who denies all charges.More
2011After 27 years of marriage, Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth announce they are breaking up.
2006Opening for Rascal Flatts at Madison Square Garden, Eric Church goes off-kilter, playing a little "Crazy Train" and staying on stage past his allotted time. He is kicked off the tour and replaced by a talented newcomer named Taylor Swift.
2003Ozzy Osbourne seeks treatment for Parkinson's Disease-like tremors and postpones a fall European tour. The veteran rock artist says in a statement, "I have been in Boston for the last three weeks, having medical tests for a tremor which has become markedly worse over the last two years."
2000The Beatles' official autobiography Anthology hits #1 on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list.
1996Madonna gives birth to her first child, a daughter named Lourdes. The father is her personal trainer, Carlos Leon.
1974Nashville veterans worry about the sanctity of country music when Olivia Newton-John wins Female Vocalist of the Year at the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards.More14
In Music History
2017Kacey Musgraves marries Ruston Kelly (also a country singer) in Tennessee.
2016JoJo releases her third album, Mad Love., her first since 2006, as legal issues have kept her from issuing new material.
2014David Bowie debuts his new single "Sue (Or In A Season Of Crime)," a jazzy seven-and-a-half-minute song, on BBC Radio 6 to promote his upcoming compilation album Nothing Has Changed.
2012B. B. Cunningham Jr., aged 70, finishes one of the most unusual lives in music history when he dies of a gunshot wound inflicted while working as a security guard at an apartment complex in Memphis, Tennessee. We mainly know Cunningham through his work with the band Hombres, who had a #12 Billboard-charting hit in 1967 with "Let It Out (Let It All Hang Out)." Cunningham was lead singer of Hombres and not to be confused with his brother Bill Cunningham, who was a member of The Box Tops. Cunningham rounded off his music career with work as a studio engineer, even returning to Memphis to launch his own studio. How he ended up as a 70-year-old security guard is anybody's guess.
2011The remake of Footloose opens in US theaters. The new film is energetic and sexy and earns better critical acclaim than its forebear. Starring Kenny Wormald and Julianne Hough, the film also resurrects the title-theme song with a cover by Blake Shelton.
2011Chuck Ruff (drummer for Edgar Winter Group and Sammy Hagar) dies in San Francisco, California, after a lengthy illness at age 60.
2010Alicia Keys gives birth to a baby boy named Egypt, and is inspired to write the song "Speechless." The father is her producer husband Swizz Beatz.
2006Country/rock singer and guitarist Freddy Fender dies of lung cancer in Corpus Christi, Texas, at age 69.
2004Ludacris and Public Enemy play the "Race to the Polls" concert at the Hammerstein Ballroom to raise voter awareness for the upcoming US presidential election.
2003Former Temptation (and Dramatic, and Lakeside member) Barrington Henderson sues the band and the Motown label for wrongful termination and millions of dollars in alleged unpaid royalties.
Michael Jackson Goes To #1 With A Song About A Rat
1972
Michael Jackson's "Ben," a song about a boy and his love for a pet rat, hits #1 in the US.
Jackson's first #1 as a solo artist, the song was written for the movie Ben, a sequel to the 1971 film Willard. In both films, Ben is a pet rat who leads a super-intelligent rat colony that turns on humans and begins killing them. In the second movie, Ben is befriended by a young boy, which is what the song is about.
The film makes little impact, but the song becomes a huge hit, with few listeners aware that Ben is a rodent.
The film makes little impact, but the song becomes a huge hit, with few listeners aware that Ben is a rodent.
No comments:
Post a Comment