20
Featured Events
2000Ice-T, who in 1992 released the incendiary song "Cop Killer," makes his debut on the TV series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit playing a cop: Detective Fin Tutuola.
1992Madonna releases Erotica, a concept album about the pleasures and pitfalls of sex and romance, a day before her controversial Sex book hits the market.More
1979The instrumental "Rise" by Herb Alpert goes to #1 in America, thanks to its use on the soap opera General Hospital.
1977In town for a gig with The Police, Sting kills some time by walking through the red light district of Paris. Watching the ladies of the night ply their trade gives him the inspiration for what becomes the band's first hit: "Roxanne."
1973The Rolling Stones ballad "Angie" hits #1 in America.
1971Snoop Dogg is born Cordozar Calvin Broadus, Jr. in Long Beach, California. His parents dub him "Snoopy" because of his resemblance to Charlie Brown's pet beagle.
1962"Monster Mash" by Bobby Pickett & the Crypt-Kickers hits #1 on its way to becoming the most famous Halloween song of all time. Pickett's vocals are his impression of Boris Karloff, who was known for his role as Frankenstein's monster.
20
In Music History
2016Little Big Town release the single "Better Man," which they later reveal was written by Taylor Swift, marking the first time she pitched a song to another artist.
2011John Mayer has throat surgery to treat a problem with his vocal cords, pushing back the release of his album Born and Raised.
2005Jazz singer/pianist Shirley Horn dies of complications from diabetes at age 71.
2003Amy Winehouse, 20, issues her first album, Frank, in the UK. It doesn't appear in America until 2007.
2002A man identifying himself as Kid Rock's personal assistant is charged with felony and misdemeanor drug possession after a traffic stop on Rock's tour bus on the Florida Turnpike. Officers find a small amount of cocaine, two marijuana cigarettes, a glass pipe, and rolling papers on Kevin J. McMahon's person and in his luggage. He is released from jail on $16,000 bond.
2001Raising money for victims of the September 11th attacks, Paul McCartney leads "The Concert For New York" in Madison Square Garden. Elton John, Billy Joel, David Bowie, The Who, and Eric Clapton all participate.
1999A year after nearly dying from pneumonia, Johnny Cash finds himself battling the condition again. Cash is listed in serious condition at Baptist Hospital in Nashville.
199898 Degrees release their breakout album, 98 Degrees and Rising, featuring the hit singles "Because Of You" and "The Hardest Thing," as well as "True To Your Heart," a duet with Stevie Wonder from the Disney movie Mulan.
1997Canned Heat guitarist Henry "The Sunflower" Vestine, age 52, dies of respiratory and heart failure in a Paris hotel room just after finishing a European tour with the band.
1996Carly Simon is unable to perform due to stage fright, aboard the Queen Elizabeth II in New York.
1991Country music singer Clint Black marries TV actress Lisa Hartman. The couple met when Hartman and her mother attended a New Year's concert Black gave in Houston.
1984A-ha make their television debut, performing four songs – including an early version of their future #1 hit "Take On Me" - on Lordagssirkus, a program from their native Norway.
1980U2 release their debut album, Boy, produced by Steve Lillywhite. It doesn't yield any hits but "I Will Follow" becomes one of their most popular songs.
1979Bob Dylan makes his only appearance on Saturday Night Live, performing three songs from his Christian album Slow Train Coming.
1978The Police make their US performance debut at CBGB's in New York.
Lynyrd Skynyrd Singer And Guitarist Killed In Plane Crash
1977Lynyrd Skynyrd members Ronnie Van Zant and Steve Gaines die in a plane crash in Mississippi. Gaines' sister Cassie, a backup singer with the group, is also killed along with two pilots and the band's manager. Other members of the group are badly injured.
At about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, a 1948 Convair CV-240 bearing Lynyrd Skynyrd and crew lifts into the sky over Greenville, South Carolina, bound for Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The atmosphere is a bit tense, as that very same plane's right engine had spewed 20 feet of fire while in flight the night before. This flight, band and crew have all agreed, will be the last one they take in the craft. They will leave the plane at their next stop in Baton Rouge and find new transportation. Two-and-a-half hours into the air and the plane's right engine starts to sputter. Keyboardist Billy Powell goes to the cockpit to ask what's wrong. The pilots, both relatively young, tell him that everything is fine and they're simply transferring oil from one wing to another. Powell returns to the seat. The right engine dies. The pilot radios Houston Air Traffic Control, tells them that their Convair is low on fuel and asks for the vectors for a McComb, Mississippi airstrip to make an emergency landing. Before the final directions to the airstrip get back to the pilots, the plane's left engine goes as well. Powell and drummer Artimus Pyle run to the cockpit to find the pilots looking terrified but keeping themselves composed enough to tell everyone to get back to their seats and get their seat belts on. Everyone buckles up except for Ronnie Van Zant, who is sleeping on the floor behind the cockpit. Artimus wakes him up, but before Van Zant can make it to his seat, the plane crashes into a wooded Mississippi swamp at approximately 90 miles per hour. Van Zant is launched from the craft and into a tree, killing him instantly. Guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Steve Gaines, his sister (and Skynyrd backup singer) Cassie, and road manager Dean Kilpatrick also die on impact. Pilot Walter McCreary and co-pilot William Gray are also killed. Pyle emerges from the wreckage with his ribs protruding from his body to see that the pilot has been decapitated. He makes it nearly a full mile to a farmhouse. Powell lies in the swamp thinking that the crash has been a sort of culmination of the violence and recklessness that the band has been living for years. He silently thanks God that the violence is over. Guitarist Gary Rossington wakes up to the sound of helicopters and the sight of search lights. He starts screaming. The helicopters can't land because of the swamp's terrain. Local farmers come to the scene and begin helping get the injured out of the wreakage while emergency crews work on bulldozing a road through the trees. Less benevolent folks arrive, as well, to scavenge memorabilia from the wreckage and even from the dead. The incident puts an abrupt stop to Lynyrd Skynyrd's climb to stardom. Just three days earlier, they released their fifth album, Street Survivors, and were filling arenas on their tour. After the crash, band members are too traumatized to go on. Added to that is the bitterness and anger they feel that their mission to become as big as The Rolling Stones has been so brutally crushed. They dive into self-medication with alcohol and drugs for many years. An eight-month National Transport Safety Bureau investigation of the crash determines that the probable cause of the accident was, "Fuel exhaustion and a total loss of power on both engines due to crew inattention of fuel supply. Contributing to the fuel exhaustion were inadequate flight planning and an engine malfunction of undetermined nature in the right engine which resulted in a higher than normal fuel consumption." Despite some eye-witness reports, no evidence of drugs or alcohol are found during autopsies performed on the pilots. At Van Zant's funeral, Merle Haggard's "I Take a Lot of Pride in What I Am" is played. Van Zant is buried with his favorite fishing pole and Texas Hatters hat. A recording of David Allen Coe's "Another Pretty Country Song" is played and Charlie Daniels sings "Amazing Grace." It is ten years before the surviving band members reunite, and it isn't until 1991 that they complete that trip to Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
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