Births
1923 Hank Williams, The biggest ever US country star. He scored 36 Top 10 Country hits including, 'Your Cheating Heart' and 'Hey Good Lookin'. Williams died in the backseat of a Cadillac on 1st January 1953 on the way to a gig.
1933 Jeanine Deckers, The Singing Nun, (1963 US No.1 & UK No.7 single 'Dominique'). Deckers died on 31st March 1985 of an overdose of sleeping pills in a suicide pact with a friend.
1939 Lamonte McLemore, The 5th Dimension, (1969 US No.1 & UK No.11 single 'Aquarius').
1947 Jim Hodder, drums, Steely Dan, (1973 US No.11 single 'Reeling In The Years'). Hodder drowned at Point Arena, California on 15th June 1990.
1950 Fee Waybill, vocals, The Tubes, (1977 UK No.28 single 'White Punks On Dope', 1983 US No.10 single 'She's A Beauty).
1959 William Owen Gregory, keyboards and synthesizer, Goldfrapp, (2008 UK No.2 album 'Seventh Tree').
1962 Baz Luhrmann, Australian filmmaker, 1999 UK No.1 single 'Everybody's Free To Wear Sunscreen').
1968 John Penney, vocals, Neds Atomic Dustbin, (1991 UK No.16 single 'Happy').
1969 Adam Devlin, The Bluetones, (1996 UK No.2 single 'Slight Return').
1969 Keith Flint, vocals, Prodigy, (1996 UK No.1 single 'Firestarter', 1997 UK & US No.1 album 'The Fat Of The Land').
1973 Anastacia, US singer, (2000 UK No. 6 single 'I'm Outta Love', her 2000 album 'Not That Kind' spent 65 weeks on the UK album chart) .
1976 Maile Misajon, Eden's Crush, (2001 US No. 8 single 'Get Over Yourself').
1985 Jonathan Jacob Walker, bassist, Panic at the Disco. (2008 Australian No.1 and US & UK No.2 album 'Pretty.Odd.).
Deaths
1991 Rob Tyner former lead singer with the Detroit band MC5 died of heart failure.
1999 Singer Frankie Vaughan died aged 71. During the 1950's he scored twenty UK Top 30 singles including the UK No.2 'Green Door.' He was made an OBE in 1965.
2000 Paula Yates was found dead in bed from a suspected drug overdose. Yates had presented the UK music TV show 'The Tube' during the 80's, married Bob Geldof and was the girlfriend of INXS singer Michael Hutchence.
Events
1931 RCA Victor Records began demonstrations of the long-playing (LP), 33-1/3 RPM phonograph record.
1939 Frank Sinatra recorded "All or Nothing at All" with the Harry James Orchestra for Columbia Records.
1952 Frank Sinatra completed his final session with Mitch Miller and Columbia Records.
1955 Capitol Records released "Magic Melody, Part Two". The song consisted only of the last two notes of the musical phrase, "Shave and a haircut, two bits." It was the shortest song to ever to be released.
1956 The BBC announced the removal of Bill Haley and His Comets' 'Rockin' Through The Rye' from its playlist because they felt the song went against traditional British standards. The record, based on an 18th century Scottish Folk tune, was at No.5 on the UK charts.
1961 Shirley Bassey was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Reach For The Stars / Climb Ev'ry Mountain.' The Welsh singers second and final UK No.1.
1962 The Beatles played the last of three Monday night gigs at The Queen's Hall, Widnes, Cheshire. Also on the bill, Billy Kramer and the Coasters, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes and Sonny Kaye and the Reds. Tickets cost 3/6.
1964 Police arrived at a Rolling Stones gig at the ABC Theatre in Carlisle, England, after a trouble broke out with the 4,000 fans at the concert.
1964 During a US tour The Beatles appeared at the Municipal Stadium in Kansas City. The Beatles were paid $150,000 for the show, which was more than any other act had ever been paid for a live show. Tickets cost $4.50.
1965 "The Smothers Brothers Show" premiered on CBS-TV.
1967 Johnny Cash played two shows at The Masonic Temple Davenport Iwoa.
1967 The Doors were banned from The Ed Sullivan Show after Jim Morrison broke his agreement with the show's producers. Morrison said before the performance that he wouldn't sing the words, "Girl, we couldn't get much higher," but did anyway.
1967 The Who appeared on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. An incident occurred with flash explosions that damaged Pete Townsend's ears.
1969 Media on both sides of the Atlantic were running stories that said Paul McCartney was dead. He was supposedly killed in a car accident in Scotland on November 9th, 1966 and that a double had been taking his place for public appearances. In fact, Paul and his girlfriend Jane Asher were on vacation in Kenya at the time.
1976 Ringo Starr released "Ringo's Rotogravure."
1976 The *** Pistols played a gig for the inmates at Chelmsford Prison, Essex in England.
1977 '20 Golden greats' by Diana Ross and The Supremes started a seven-week run at No.1 on the UK chart.
1980 Bette Midler's concert film "Divine Madness" premiered in Los Angeles, CA.
1983 Vanessa Williams, as Miss New York, became the first black woman to be crowned Miss America.
1983 Paul Young scored his first UK No.1 album with his debut release 'No Parlez.' The album returned to the top of the charts on four other occasion's spending a total of 119 weeks on the chart.
1984 Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark kicked off a 14-date UK tour at Bristol Colston Hall.
1989 Natalie Cole married Andre Fisher. Cole filed for a divorce less than three years later.
1989 At the Emmy Awards, Paula Abdul won Best Choreography for her work on "The Tracey Ullman Show."
1991 "Use Your Illusion I" and "Use Your Illusion II" were released simultaneously by Guns N' Roses.
1991 Over 4 million copies of Guns N' Roses album, 'Use Your Illusion I' and 'Use Your Illusion II' were simultaneously released for retail sale, making it the largest ship-out in pop history in the US.
1992 Tiffany gave birth to her son Elijah Bulmaro.
1994 Boyz II Men started a two-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with 'II'.
1994 Whigfield started a four-week run at No.1 in the UK with the single 'Saturday Night'.
1996 A bomb was found at a South London sorting office addressed to Icelandic singer Bjork. Police in Miami had alerted the post office after finding the body of Ricardo Lopez who had made a video of himself making the bomb and then killing himself.
1997 Fleetwood Mac began their reunion tour with the support of their LP "The Dance."
1998 An American Airlines flight made an emergency stop in Denver because a passenger had become violent after meeting Hootie & The Blowfish on the plane.
1998 Terri Clark had her shoulder dislocated when she was pulled from a moving car at the New Mexico State Fair. A male fan had pulled her from the open car.
1998 A 19-year-old man was taken off a plane in Denver after harassing members of Hootie & the Blowfish who were travelling in the first class section of the plane.
1998 Wu-Tang Clan rapper Ol' Dirty Bastard (Russell Jones) was arrested on a charge of making terrorist threats in Los Angeles. He had been ejected from the House of Blues nightclub and had threatened to return and kill them all.
1999 Eminem had a $10 million lawsuit filed against him. The suit, brought by his mother, claimed that he had made defamatory remarks in several interviews.
2002 Kelly Clarkson's first single "Before Your Love/A Moment Like This" was released.
2003 David Lee Roth injured himself while doing a very fast, complicated 15th-century samurai move onstage. Roth needed 21 stitches when a staff he was using hit him in the face. A few days later the remainder of his tour was canceled.
2003 Moore and Bode Cigars were suing P Diddy after film footage of their "secret" production process turned up in his latest video. The company claimed an unidentified cameraman filmed their "unique method of rolling cigars" which was then used in the rappers 'Shake Ya Tailfeather' video without permission.
2004 Israeli police arrested two of Madonna's bodyguards after they assaulted photographers waiting for the singer outside her hotel. Madonna was in Israel with 2,000 other students of Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical offshoot.
2006 Justin Timberlake went to No.1 on the UK album chart with 'Futuresex / Lovesounds' the singers second solo album and second No.1.
