Today in Music History...February 21, 2017

Music History: February 21

 

2013  Cleotha Staples (The Staple Singers)

2012 Adele flips off producers at the Brit Awards when she is ushered off stage before she can finish the acceptance speech for her Album of the Year win.

2012 In an an anti-Kremlin protest, three members of the band Pussy Riot perform an impromptu, obscenity-filled song at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour of the Russian Orthodox Church, Moscow. They are promptly ejected, and later arrested for hooliganism, making headlines around the world.

2011 Lady Gaga performs the first of two shows at Madison Square Garden that will make up the footage of her HBO concert special in May.

2008 Crystal Gayle is inducted into the Kentucky Music Hall of Fame.

2008 Paramore cancel a European tour because of "internal struggles." Thankfully, the band doesn't split.

2008 In what is reported as one of eBay's most expensive sales yet, the online auction house brokers a deal between an unnamed US music collector and an unnamed Irish collector for three million albums and singles in various formats, for a grand total of about one dollar per item.

2007 The movie studio Dreamworks takes out a full-page ad in Variety and The Hollywood Reporter apologizing for (but not exactly admitting to) similarities between their movie Dreamgirls, adapted from the stage musical, and the book Dreamgirl: My Life As a Supreme by former Supreme Mary Wilson. The book gives a look at the behind-the-scenes manipulations at Motown Records, bearing similarities to the stories recounted in Dreamgirls.

2004 Les Gray (Mud)

2003 Ringo Starr and Mark Hudson announce a new indie label startup of theirs, named pumkinhead.

1990 Johnny Ray

1990 Paul McCartney is honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 32nd annual Grammy Awards, perhaps to make up for the paltry four awards they gave to The Beatles while they were still active. Bonnie Raitt is the big winner on the night, with four awards, including Album of the Year for Nick Of Time.

1987 Sly Stone is jailed for possession of cocaine in Los Angeles, an arrest which sends the singer into retirement and virtual seclusion upon his release.

1986 Charlotte Church

1986 Pat Boone appears on the "Beach Blanket Bounty" episode of the NBC show The Fall Guy.
1983 Performing in Cleveland on the ninth date of a 48-date US tour, Adam Ant collapses on stage with torn cartilage in his knee; he returns after being seen by a doctor and finishes on one leg.

1983 Rick Wakeman of Yes and girlfriend Nina Carter become the proud parents of their first child, daughter Jemma.

1982 Murray The K dies at age 60. As a disc jockey in New York City, he held showcase concerts featuring many top acts - Stevie Wonder, The Lovin' Spoonful and The Supremes were just a few of the artists to play his revues. He also was an early champion of The Beatles, hyping the band when they came to America and calling himself "The Fifth Beatle."

1981 The Australian composer Ron Grainer, best known for writing the "Doctor Who Theme," dies at age 58.

1980 Jacob Miller (Inner Circle)

1980 Janet Vogel

1979 The Dire Straits album is certified gold

1977 Neil Diamond plays a televised concert at the Greek theater in Los Angeles. The show was released as the live album Love At The Greek.

1976 The Four Seasons hit #1 in the UK with "December 1963 (Oh What a Night)." It's the only UK #1 for the group, who also topped the American charts with the song, where it was their fifth #1.

1974 Kool and the Gang's "Jungle Boogie" is certified gold.

1970 Eric Wilson (Sublime)

1970 The Jackson 5 make their television debut on ABC's American Bandstand.

1970 John Lennon's "Instant Karma!" enters the pop charts.

1969 Elvis Presley purchases a Kodak microfilm reader and begins microfilming over 4,000 personal items.

1969 Elvis Presley, "The Fair's Moving On" 

1968  After making an offer of $150,000, publishing firm McGraw-Hill beats out eight other contenders for the rights to Hunter Davies' authorized biography of The Beatles.

1967 The Beatles, "Fixing A Hole"

1967 Elvis Presley, "The Girl I Never Loved," "How Can You Lose What You Never Had?," "A House That Has Everything," "Clambake," "Hey, Hey, Hey"

1966 The Beatles, Nowhere Man b/w What Goes On

1966 Elvis Presley begins filming his 22nd movie, Spinout. He also tells a local Los Angeles paper about the gospel album he's currently working on, eventually titled How Great Thou Art.

1964 The Beatles leave the US and return to England after their triumphant first visit.

1964 The Rolling Stones, Not Fade Away

1964 Billy Joel joins his first rock band: The Echoes, who specialize in playing the hits by UK bands.

1962 Mudhoney singer/guitarist Mark Arm is born Mark McLaughlin, at the Vandenberg Air Force Base, in Lompoc, California.

1961 Ranking Roger (General Public)

1961 The Beatles make their debut at the Cavern Club in Liverpool, where they will become regulars for lunchtime sessions.

1958 Mary Chapin Carpenter

1958 Gibson's first "Flying V" guitar is shipped from a factory in factory in Kalamazoo, MI.

1956 Lester Hunt (The Climax Blues Band)

1952 A 17-year-old Jerry Lee Lewis marries his first wife, preacher's daughter Dorothy Barton, in what is rumored to be a shotgun wedding.

1951 Vince Welnick (The Tubes, Grateful Dead)

1949 Jerry Harrison (Talking Heads)

1945 Paul Newton (Uriah Heep)

1943 David Geffen

1942 Bob Day (The Allisons)

1938 Bobby Charles

1933 Jazz singer Nina Simone is born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina, where she would began playing the piano at age 3.

1891 Circus music composer Karl Lawrence King is born in Ohio.

Featured Events

1995 Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band perform live together for the first time in seven years, playing the new song "Murder Incorporated" at a club in New York City.

1987 Twenty-six years after becoming a hit in America, Ben E. King's "Stand By Me" goes to #1 in the UK following its release in the movie of the same name.

1977 At a concert stop at the Nassau Coliseum, every member of Kiss has some blood drawn. It's not for the Red Cross: the blood will be mixed with ink used to print the first Kiss comic book, which appears in June. The process from bloodletting to print is notarized for authenticity.