Today In Music, April 30th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Wednesday 30th April):

Birth

1943. Bobby Vee born Robert Veline in Fargo, North Dakota.

On Stage

1975. Ex-New York Dolls, Johnny Thunders and Jerry Nolan make their live debut with their new band, The Heartbreakers. In the audience at Club 82 in New York is Andrew Jakeman (Jake Riviera) soon to be of Stiff Records.

In The Press

1977. A new fanzine is launched in Ayr, Scotland. The eigteen-year old behind it is Mike Scott. The first issue covers everything from The Beach Boys to The Sex Pistols. Mike is a frustrated musician who has fronted a band of mates for some years under the name Karma. One day he will find fame and fortune himself as leader of The Waterboys.

On The Street

1997. Biz Markie is pulled over at a checkpoint in Harlem driving a new Mercedes. He is unable to show a valid driver’s licence but offers police his boat licence instead. Unfortunately, Markie’s licence is currently suspended (for the 19th time). He is given an on the spot fine of $ 250.

On Television

2002. Late Show With David Letterman (CBS, U.S.A.) Show #1796. Musical guest: Wilco performing “War On War”.

Death

1966. Songwriter, Richard Farina, dies when he crashes his motorcycle after the launch party for his book, “Been Down So Long, It Looks Like Up To Me’.

 

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Today In Music, April 29th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Tuesday 29th April):

Birth

1953. Bill Drummond (The KLF) born William Butterworth in South Africa.

On Tour

1970. “Twiggs” Lyndon, road manager for the Allman Brothers Band stabs club owner Angelo Aliotta three times with a ten-inch fishing knife after he refuses to pay the band for two shows they played the previous night. Aliotta dies about an hour later. Twiggs refuses to run from the cops and is arrested and charged with first-degree murder. When he eventually comes to trial, after spending 18 months in jail, he’s found not-guilty having proved that working for the band had driven him to temporary insanity!

In Government

1997. Speaker Of The House, Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader, Trent Lott honour Tori Amos‘s Rape Abuse and Incest National Network at a ceremony in Washington. The singer launched RAINN in 1994 with her own money and contributions from Atlantic Records and Warner Music Group. Rep. Susan Molinari (Republican, New York) announces that May 16th will be RAINN Day as a tribute to the 142,000+ victims the service has helped in three years.

In Hospital

1992. Country singer Doug Stone undergoes quadruple bypass surgery in Nashville, Tennessee only three days after complaining of chest pains at a concert in Oregon.

On Television

2000. Later… With Jools Holland (BBC-2, U.K.) 15.3. Bobby Whitlock – “Bell Bottomed Blues (with Jools And Eric Clapton)”, “Wing And A Prayer (with Jools And Eric Clapton)”, “Later Jam (with Jools And Eric Clapton)”; Doves – “Catch The Sun”, “The Cedar Room”; Ute Lemper – “The Part You Throw Away”; Embrace – “You’re Not Alone”, “Hooligan”, “Save Me”; Lynden David Hall – “Sleeping With Victor”, “Let’s Do It Again (with Hinda Hicks)”. Here’s “Bell Bottomed Blues”.

Death

1993. Guitarist and producer, Mick Ronson dies in London after a two year battle against liver cancer.

 

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Today In Music, April 28th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Monday 28th April):

Birth

1967. Graham Bonnar (Swervedriver) born in Scotland.

On Stage

1968. Rock musical, “Hair” makes its Broadway debut at the Biltmore Theater.

In Court

1997. A warrant is issued for the arrest of rapper Foxy Brown when she fails to appear in court in Raleigh, North Carolina to answer a charge of simple assault. Brown, who was charged under her real name of Inga Marchand, is alleged to have spat in the faces of two hotel clerks when they were unable to give her an iron for her clothes. One of Brown’s lawyers said that the hotel workers were planning on suing the rapper for $ 1 million for their trauma although no lawsuit had been filed.

In The Press

1989. The Sun announces that Bros have dumped guitarist Craig Logan and are giving him a £ 1 million pay-off. Logan storms round to the band’s office, slams a copy of the tabloid on the table and declares, “I’m worth more than that”. He pledges to sue for more and then heads for his solicitors.

On Television

1998. Late Show With David Letterman (CBS, U.S.A.) Show #0997. Musical guest: Dave Matthews Band. Here they are with, “Don’t Drink The Water”.

Death

1975. DJ, manager and co-founder of Autumn Records, Tom Donahue dies in San Francisco from a heart attack.

Music Paper From Today
 

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Today In Music, April 27th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (April):

Birth

1959. Marco Pirroni (Adam And The Ants) born in London, England.

On Stage

1998. The ninth annual benefit for The Rainforest Foundation takes place at New York’s Carnegie Hall. Sting, Madonna, Billy Joel and Elton John are among the artists taking part. The foundation is co-founded and led by Sting’s wife, Trudy Styler and will raise an estimated $ 2 million dollars from tonight’s event.

In Court

1998. In Los Angeles, US District Judge Dean Pregerson extends a banning order against Internet Entertainment Group preventing them marketing a video tape showing Pamela Anderson and her former boyfriend, Brett Michaels (Poison) having sex. Both Anderson and Michaels have launched separate $ 90 million lawsuits against the company claiming violation of their privacy.

On The Road

2001. Country star Trisha Yearwood returns to her hometown of Monticello, Georgia, for a public ceremony that sees Highway 83N’s name officially changed to te Trisha Yearwood Parkway

On Television

1986. The South Bank Show (ITV, U.K.) Show number 218. Velvet Underground. Here’s a clip from it featuring John Cale singing, “Thoughtless Kind”.  

Death

2000. Vicki Sue Robinson, who had a worldwide disco hit in 1976 with. “Turn The Beat Around” dies of cancer at her home in Wilton, Connecticut, aged 46.

Music Paper From Today
  

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Today In Music, April 26th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Saturday 26th April):

Birth

On Tour

1982. The Clash postpone their UK tour when Joe Strummer goes missing.

In Court

1999. The David Geffen Corporation and Bong Load Custom Records file separate lawsuits against Beck. Both companies are seeking a court ruling that will enforce their rights over the artist. The legal action stems from a clause that Beck insisted on in his original 1994 contracts that allows him to record “non-commercial” music for small independent labels. Both DGC and Bong Load now want to stifle his indie productions to ensure the commercial viability of their “product”. Since DGC and its parent company, Polygram, were consumed by the Universal Group, Beck has seen the managers and contacts within DGC replaced with people less sympathetic to his ideals. As a result, he’s made it clear that he feels his contract is no longer binding.

In The Press

1976. David Bowie gives an interview to a journalist in Stockholm, Sweden which sparks a storm of controversy in the British press. He later repudiates his remarks: “As I can see it, I am the only alternative for the premier in Britain. I believe Britain could benefit from a fascist leader. After all, fascism is really nationalism”. Oops!

On Television

1993. Later… With Jools Holland (BBC-2, U.K.) First show of series 2. P J Harvey – “Naked Cousin”, “Wang Dang Doodle; Maria McKee – “I Can’t Make it Alone; Vince Gill – “No Future In The Past”, “(Don’t Let Your Love) Start Slipping Away; Sounds of Blackness – “I’m Going all The Way”, “Pressure Pt II”, “Optimistic; Alice In Chains – “Them Bones”, “Would”.

Death

1984. Count Basie dies in Hollywood, Florida.

 

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Today In Music, April 25th

 
From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Friday 25th April):

Birth

1933. Jerry Leiber, one half of the legendary Leiber And Stoller songwriting partnership, born in Baltimore.

Front Page News

1999. Radio 2 DJ Johnnie Walker is pictured on the front page of the News Of The World snorting coke. During an obvious “sting” by the paper, Walker is alleged to have offered its reporters (who he believed to be media tycoons) drugs and vice girls.

In Court

2001. Tommy Lee appears in Manhattan Federal Court defending himself against charges that he plagiarized the name of his new band Methods Of Madness from a Swedish company that produces sound effects CDs. Whilst on the stand, Lee manages to extoll the virtues of prison. Exlplaining what he’d done during the four month sentence he’d received after pleading no contest in 1998 to charges of kicking his then wife, Pamela Anderson, said he’d recommend it to anybody. “Not Jail, but a four-month break from everything and everybody”. He’d spent the time writing lyrics and music and would use his telephone calls to sing the tunes into his ansafone at home.

In Hospital

2003. Rapper Freeky Zeeky, a member of Cam’ron‘s Diplomats is hospitalized after a shooting that leaves him injured and another man dead. Freeky, real name Ezekial Jiles was shot in the chest and abdomen after two cars were involved in a minor collision.

Witnesses said that after the shunt, the occupants of both cars started shooting each other. The dead man, Eric Mangrum was travelling with Jiles. Neither the other car, nor its occupants, have been found.

In Television

1978. It’s announced that Eurovision Song Contest Winners, Izhar Cohen and Alphabeta will not be allowed to appear live on this week’s “Top Of The Pops”. The ban stems from the actors union, Equity, which has a long standing agreement with the BBC to only allow foreign groups on the show if their record is already in the Top 30. The BBC is also required to give the union three weeks notice of any intended foreign guest appearances. With the competition only having been won at the weekend and an English version of the song only being released this week, neither condition can be met. It seems likely that a recording of the group’s winning performance will be aired instead.
 

Death

1974. Pamela Courson, heir to Jim Morrison‘s estate and his common-law wife, dies of a drug overdose.

 

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Today In Music, April 24th

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Thursday 24th April):

Birth

1954. Captain Sensible (The Damned) born Raymond Burns in Balham, London, England.

On Tour

1981. Members of the rock groups Pretty Nice People and Sounds run into trouble whilst taking time off from their Anti-Nuclear fund-raising tour of Scotland. Dave Cowley of Pretty Nice People gets stuck 80 feet up a 120 foot cliff face, half a mile south of Stonehaven, where the bands have been climbing. Cowley was unable to move from a small piece of rock when the area around him crumbled away. Steve Lake, 25 year old singer with Sounds, climbed up the cliff and ran to a nearby farmhouse for help. The Stonehaven Coastguard Cliff Rescue Team were soon on the scene and had Cowley hauled to safety, uninjured but suffering from the effects of the cold.

In Custody

1978. Dennis Wilson (The Beach Boys) is arrested in an hotel room in Tucson, Arizona and charged with “contributing to the delinquency of a minor”. Police are called after the mother of the sixteen year old girl he has with him calls them at 3.55 am to say she breached her curfew.

In Court

2002. Judge Robert Alsdorf, sitting in Washington State Superior Court, rules that Courtney Love will not be required to undergo a psychiatric evaluation. The ruling stems from an attempt by ex-Nirvana members, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic to prove that the Hole frontwoman suffered from an identifiable mental problem that makes her “unmanageable, inconsistent and unpredictable” in her business dealings.

The motion to seek the evaluation came in the middle of Grohl and Novoselic’s battle with Love over the rights to the Nirvana catalogue. In September last year, Love filed suit against the pair and Universal Music Group seeking to have their contract declared void and all rights to the band passed to her. In December, they countersued to have her case dismissed. In 1997, Love, Grohl and Novoselic formed the Nirvana LLC p[artnership to manage all the band’s assets. Love now wants total control. Needless to say, the case continues.

On Television

1967. The Monkees (NBC, U.S.A.) in an episode entitled, “Monkees On Tour”.

Death

1970. Blues pianist Otis Spann dies of cancer in Chicago’s Cook County Hospital.

Music Paper From Today

Disc from 24th April 1971. A copy taken from Rockmine’s almost complete run of U.K. music papers from the last 45 years. 

 

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Today In Music, April 23rd

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Wednesday 23rd April):

Birth

1939. Ray Peterson, who had a hit with ‘Tell Laura I Love Her’, born in Denton, Texas.

On Stage

1977. Siouxsie And The Banshees play London’s Roxy Club. In the audience are a bunch of students from Hornsey Art College. Led by Stuart Goddard,they are inspired to form a new band – The Ants. Meanwhile, not that far away, the club’s promoter, Andrew Czeczowski, is being thrown off the premises. After running gigs there for four months, it seems he hasn’t given the owners any of the £ 25,000 a year they’re charging him.

In Government

1997. The Texas State Senate passes a bill prohibiting investment in companies that promote or produce lyrics depicting criminal violence, murder, assault, gang activities, race hatred or acts of sexual deviance. The bill allows state investors and pension funds until January 1st 1999 to get their money out of any record labels that might be deemed to be in contravention of the law.

In Court

2001. Eminem pleads no contest to two gun charges in an Oakland County, Michigan court. The rapper is charged, under his real nmame of Marshall Mathers III, with carrying a concealed firearm and brandishing a weapon during an arguement with the road manager for Insane Clown Posse outside a store in Royal oak, Michigan last year.

Sentencing is set for June 5th. Mathers’ lawyers advised the no contest plea in expectation of probation rather than a possible 5 years in prison. earlier this month, Eminem was sentenced to two years probation for carrying a concealed weapon during a fight outside a Detroit nightclub.

On Television

2004. The Ellen DeGeneres Show (Syndicated, U.S.A.) 142. Guests include David Bowie. Here he is with, “Changes”.

Death

1975. Pete Ham (Badfinger) hangs himself in his garage after a period of depression.

 

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Today In Music, April 22nd

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (April):

Birth

1937. Arranger and producer Jack Nitzsche born in Chicago, Illinois.

On Stage

1978. Bob Marley headlines the One Love peace concert in Kingston, Jamaica. In an effort to bring together the island’s different factions he is joined onstage by the Prime Minister, Michael Manley and leader of the opposition, Edward Seaga. All proceeds from the event go to unemployed street kids.

In Court

1988. Mick Jagger is back in the Federal Court in White Plains, New York State for the copyright infringement case brought against him by reggae songwriter Patrick Alley. This time he treats the court to several live performances and plays demos of the song “Just Another Night” in its different stages of completion to show how it had evolved.

At The Barber Shop

1964. Wallace Scowcroft, president of the National Association Of Hairdressers, offers a free haircut to the next group or soloist to top the charts in an attempt to improve the styles sported by bands. He says, “The Rolling Stones are the worst. One of them looks like he’s got a feather duster on his head”.

In Church.

1999. Sinead O’Connor is ordained into the priesthood by a renegade catholic bishop. She is given the name Mother Bernadette Mary in a ceremony at the Marian shrine in Lourdes, France. The ordination is not acknowledged by the Roman Catholic Church which does not allow women into the priesthood. It was carried out by Bishop Michael Cox who recently founded the Latin Tridentine Church, a sect based in Palmar de Troya in Spain.

On Television

2006. Parkinson (ITV, U.K.) – George Michael performs “Everything She Wants”.

Death

1998. Tejano singer Eloy Bernal (61) dies when the bus he is driving overturns in a ditch in Corpus Christie, Texas. It’s thought he had fallen asleep at the wheel. His fatal injuries are caused when he is thrown through the windscreen as the bus hits the ditch. His daughter Rita (23) and son, Edward (27), both members of his band, are injured during the accident.

 
 

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Today In Music, April 21st

From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Monday 21st April):

Birth

1947. Iggy Pop is born James Jewel Osterburg in Muskegan, Ann Arbor, Michigan.

On Tour

1978. 21-year-old aspiring keyboard star Peter John Vitesse (Jethro Tull 1982-86) comes a cropper on his first professional engagement. He’s been booked as part of The Vikings for a summer season at the International Grill Suite in Garmische, Bavaria. Arriving at Zeebrugge at 9.30 a.m., the band is confronted by waiting customs officials wanting to see their carnet (an inventory of equipment they are carrying). Unfortunately the band doesn’t have one and is told that unless they cough up 1/3rd of the value of the gear as a refundable bond, they won’t be able to enter Belgium and travel on to Germany. Arriving back in their home town of Blairgowrie in Scotland the next day, group leader Graham Duncan said he has put the matter into the hands of his M.P., Mr. Douglas Crawford.

In Court

1990. Amy Grant sues Marvel Comics when they use her image in a Dr. Strange comic.

In Church

1993. Bill Wyman (56), marries Suzanne Accosta (33) in the dungeon of the registry office in St. Paul de Vence, France. Following the ceremony, the couple receive a blessing from the village’s Anglican priest, Keith Anderson in the 13th century church of the Conversion Of St. Paul. A reception for the 42 guests is held at the Colombe D’Or Hotel. None of The Rolling Stones attend. It’s Wyman’s third marriage.

In Hospital

1998. Frank Sinatra enters the Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles for tests but is allowed to return home later in the afternoon. A spokesman for the 82 year old star later describes the hospital visit as a routine checkup.

On Television

1979. Rockpalast (WDR, West Germany) – J. Geils Band, Patti Smith Group, Johnny Winter (Grugahalle Essen). Here’s a totally bizarre interview with Patti, Richard Sohl and Lenny Kaye.

Death

1971. Ska trombonist, Don Drummond, dies in Jamaica’s Bellevue mental asylum. He’d been locked-up there after killing his common-law wife.

 

 

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