This is the week that was in matters musical…
Bit of a Beatles week this one…
1862, composer Achille-Claude Debussy is born…
1906, the first Victrola, with wind-up drive and its own horn, is marketed by Victor Talking Machine Company in Camden, NJ, for $200…
1938, one of the most covered standards ever, “Ain’t Misbehavin'” by Fats Waller, Harry Brooks, and Andy Razaf, is recorded by Waller…
1947, in yet another demonstration that fame can get you almost anything, President Truman’s daughter Margaret Truman makes her singing debut to an audience of 15,000 at the Hollywood Bowl…
1962, Ringo Starr joins the Beatles onstage for the first time at the Cavern Club in Liverpool after taking over from Pete Best, who was deemed not fab enough to be one of the four…also this week John Lennon marries Cynthia Powell in a quiet civil ceremony with Paul McCartney as best man…in 1968 a more jaded Cynthia files for divorce after coming home from a vacation to find Yoko Ono living in the Lennons’ London home…
1964, The Chipmunks Sing the Beatles is reportedly selling 25,000 copies of John and Paul’s compositions a DAY…meanwhile, the Fab Four begin their first tour of the U.S. at the Cow Palace in San Francisco…the Righteous Brothers and Jackie DeShannon are also on the bill…
1965, the bobbies show what they think of those unruly rock ‘n’ roll fans by turning a fire hose on a bunch of Rolling Stones fans gathered at a planned TV taping in Manchester…
1966, the Beatles arrive in New York for a concert at Shea Stadium…a couple of girl fans threaten to jump from their hotel room’s 22nd-floor window unless they see the group…they get to see some cops instead and are charged with disorderly conduct…also this week, John Lennon generates more controversy after his recent “Jesus” comments by publicly expressing his admiration for American draft dodgers while the band is in Toronto…still later in the week the lads are pelted with stinky garbage in Memphis by those who take umbrage with John’s ill-advised Jesus comparisons…
1967, The New York Times reports on the new noise-reduction system for records and tapes pioneered by Dolby Laboratories…drummers everywhere pan the system as a cymbal killer…
1968, responding to a study reporting damage to the ears of guinea pigs subjected to loud music, New York disco owner, Steve Paul, quips, “Should a major increase in guinea pig attendance occur at The Scene, we’ll certainly bear their comfort in mind”…
1969, Frank Zappa’s “tired of playing for people who clap for all the wrong reasons,” so he breaks up the Mothers of Invention…most of the other Mothers take it very hard since Frank didn’t found the band and they have all been putting up with his dictatorial style in order to get to the big time…at the moment they finally arrive, Frank cuts them loose…some of the band members will play in later incarnations of the Mothers, but the original lineup is history…also this week, Mick Jagger, during the filming of Ned Kelly in Bungendore, New South Wales, Australia, is accidentally shot in the hand…he is not injured too badly…this is also the week Miles Davis goes into the studio in New York for the first sessions of the landmark album Bitches Brew with Chick Corea, Wayne Shorter, Joe Zawinul, Jack DeJohnette, Dave Holland, Benny Maupin, John McLaughlin, Larry Young, Harvey Brooks, Lenny White, Don Alias, and Jumma Santos…this who’s who list of nascent fusion greats will be expanded during later recording sessions for the double-album set…in later years the album will be expanded by Columbia Records to a full four-CD set of the complete sessions…
1977, the Police play their first gig as a threesome after guitar man Henri Padovani leaves the band…also this week, Peter Frampton comes alive in three sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden…it’s a black day at Graceland when over 75,000 people gather to lay the King to rest…Presley is entombed near his mother in a marble mausoleum in Memphis at Forest Hill Cemetery…the day before the funeral, Florists Transworld Delivery (FTD) sells more flowers than they have for any other single event…
1980, 1,400 Alice Cooper fans in Toronto take umbrage when the original make-up rocker gets sick and can’t make the show…they throw a big stinkin’ riot in protest…
1992, Courtney Love has Kurt Cobain’s baby, Frances Bean…also this week, after 10 years of going steady, Sting and Trudi Styler tie the knot…
1995, Courtney Love blows her cork when the audience at a Hole concert doesn’t get ecstatic over her performance on the last night of the Lollapalooza tour in Mountain View, CA….security guards carry her off the stage when she begins to physically fight with audience members…
1997, promoting their upcoming Bridges to Babylon tour, the Rolling Stones show up for a media event at the Brooklyn Bridge in a red ’55 Cadillac with Mick at the wheel…
2003, OSHA fines Derco LLC–the company that operated The Station Club–$85,200 for violations that resulted in the fire that killed 100 Great White fans and a band member in February…the band itself is fined $7,000…the OSHA fines are just the tip of the iceberg of legal proceedings against those responsible for the deadly fire…
…and that was the week that was.
Arrivals:
August 17: Mark (“Teen Angel”) Dinning (1933), bluesman Luther Allison (1939), Sib Hashian of Boston (1949), Eric Johnson (1954), XTC’s Colin Moulding (1955), Belinda Carlisle (1958), Gilby Clark of Guns N’ Roses (1962), Maria McKee (1964), Steve Gorman of the Black Crowes (1965), Jill Cunniff of Luscious Jackson (1966), Donnie Wahlberg of New Kids on the Block (1969), Posdnuous of De La Soul (1969)
August 18: lyricist Otto Harbach (1873), folk singer Cisco Houston (1918), Johnny Preston (1939), Nona Hendryx (1945), Dennis Elliot of Foreigner (1950), Ron Stryker of Men at Work (1957), Dr. Spot (1960), Everlast (1969)
August 19: jazz pianist Jimmy Rowles (1918), Ginger Baker (1939), Johnny “I Can See Clearly Now” Nash (1940), vocalist Billy J. Kramer of the Dakotas (1943), Ian Gillian of Deep Purple (1945), Queen’s John Deacon (1951), Lee Ann Womack (1966)
August 20: jazz trombonist Jack Teagarden (1905), Jim Reeves (1924), jazz guitarist Jimmy Raney (1927), bluesman J.J. Malone (1935), country singer-songwriter Justin Tubb (1935), Tom Coster of Santana (1941), Isaac Hayes (1942), John Povey of The Pretty Things (1942), James Pankow of Chicago (1947), Robert Plant (1948), Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy (1951), Rudy Gatlin of The Gatlin Brothers (1952), Doug Fieger of The Knack (1952), John Hiatt (1952), Fred Durst of Limp Bizkit (1970)
August 21: William “Count” Basie (1904), gospel singer Clara Ward (1924), Kenny Rogers (1938), country picker James Burton (1939), Harold W. Reid of The Statler Brothers (1939), Glenn Hughes of Deep Purple (1952), Steve Smith of Journey (1954), Joe Strummer of The Clash (1955), Budgie born Pete Clark of Siouxsie and the Banshees (1957), Kim Sledge of Sister Sledge (1958), Liam Howlett of Prodigy (1971)
August 22: Claude Debussy (1862), classic blues singer Addie “Sweet Peas” Spivey (1910), John Lee Hooker (1917), Carolina Slim born Edward P. Harris (1923), Bob Flanigan of The Four Freshmen (1926), Freddie Milano of The Belmonts (1939), Jackie De Shannon (1944), Donna Godchaux of The Grateful Dead (1947), Teresa Davis of The Emotions (1950), country chirper and writer Holly Dunn (1957), Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid (1958), Debbi Peterson of The Bangles (1961), Roland Orzabal of Tears For Fears (1961), Tori Amos (1963), James DeBarge of DeBarge (1963), Layne Staley of Alice in Chains (1967), Matchbox 20’s Paul Douchette (1972), Howie Dorough of Backstreet Boys (1973)
August 23: Gene Kelly (1912), Tex Williams (1917), The Drifters’ Rudy Lewis (1936), Bunny Lee (1941), Ramon Phillips of The Nashville Teens (1941), Keith Moon (1947), Rick Springfield (1949), Shadows of Knight’s Jim Sohns (1949), Jim Jamison of Survivor (1951), Steve Clark of Def Leppard (1960), Dean DeLeo of the Stone Temple Pilots (1961), Colin Angus of The Shamen (1961), The Happy Mondays’ Shaun Ryder (1962)
Departures:
August 17: James Brown’s bassman Bernard Odum (2004), soul singer Johnny Sayles (1993), guitarist Phil Seymour (1993), Pearl Bailey (1990), soul singer Lorraine Ellison (1985), Temptations singer and guitarist Paul Williams (1973)
August 18: founder of the Country Gentlemen bluegrass picker Charlie Waller (2004), film composer Elmer Bernstein (2004), Spiders leader Leonard “Chick” Carbo (1998), ivory tickler Michael M. Jones (1984)
August 19: soul singer Betty Everett (2001), jazz saxist Guy Durosier (1999), Belgian impresario and concert promoter Freddy Cousaert (1998), session pianist Richard Tee (1993), rockabilly star Dorsey Burnette (1979), Blind Willie McTell (1959)
August 20: Blues Traveler bassist Bobby Sheehan (1999), masterful steel guitarist Leon McAuliffe of Bob Wills’ Texas Playboys (1988), jazz trumpeter Thad Jones (1986)
August 21: Tarheel Slim born Alden Bunn (1977), country guitarist Sam McGee (1975)
August 22: honky-tonk legend Floyd Tilman (2003), blues pianist Leonard “Baby Doo” Caston (1987), bluesman John Lee Granderson (1979)
August 23: original Pip Eleanor O. Guest (1997), Skinny Puppy drummer Dwayne Goettell (1995), Oscar Hammerstein II (1960)