Rock History August 10
1968, The lineup for day two of the National Jazz & Blues Festival was Alan Haven, Deep Purple, Ginger Baker, Jeff Beck Group, Joe Cocker, Mike Westbrook, Ronnie Scott, T. Rex, Ten Years After, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, The Don Rendell & Ian Carr Quintet, and The Nice. The festival was held at Kempton Park Racecourse, Sunbury On Thames, England.
1968, Jimi Hendrix played at the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago.
1968, Tom Jones went to number one on the album chart with Delilah.
1969, During a North American tour, Led Zeppelin appeared at the San Diego Sports Arena. Jethro Tull and The Surprise Package, a Seattle band, were the supporting acts.
1970, Elvis Presley played the first night of a four-week engagement, playing two shows most nights, at The International Hotel in Las Vegas.
1970, Simon and Garfunkel’s album Bridge Over Troubled Water was at number one on the album chart, The Beatles were second with Let It Be and Bob Dylan was at number three with Self Portrait.
1971, The Who play at Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
1972, Paul and Linda McCartney were arrested and fined £800 ($1200)for possession of cannabis in a drug bust after a concert in Gothenburg, Sweden.
1972, Emerson, Lake & Palmer play the Hollywood Sportatorium in Hollywood, Florida.
1973, KISS perform at the Hotel Diplomat, New York.
1973, a promotional film for Roger Daltrey’s performance of “I’m Free” with the London Symphony Orchestra airs on Top Of The Pops. It was shot at Roger’s farm.
1974, Roberta Flack went to number one on the US singles chart with “Feel Like Makin’ Love,” the singer’s third US chart topper.
1974, The Allman Brothers Band performed at August Jam at the Charlotte Motor Speedway, Charlotte, North Carolina. Also on the bill were Emerson Lake & Palmer, Foghat, Black Oak Arkansas, and the Marshall Tucker Band.
1974, John Denver went to number one on the US album chart with Back Home Again.
1976, Elton John played the first of ten nights sold out nights at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The $1.25 million (£833,000) generated from the shows broke the record set by The Rolling Stones in 1975.
1976, Eric Clapton appeared at The Apollo, Glasgow, Scotland.
1976, Neil Diamond performed at the Capital Centre, Landover, Maryland.
1977, Yes played the Springfield Civic Center, Springfield, Massachusetts.
1978, Thin Lizzy appeared at the Mid-South Coliseum, Memphis, Tennessee.
1978, Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, and Keith Moon arrive separately at Universal Studios, Hollywood for the press launch of their new album Who Are You. The party takes place on the set of the TV show Battlestar Galactica.
1979, Van Halen played at the Cumberland County Civic Center, Portland, Maine.
1980, Black Sabbath appeared at the Civic Center, Hartford,Connecticut.
1981, Kansas performed at Pine Knob Music Theatre, Clarkston, Michigan.
1982, During a North American, tour Queen appeared at the Coliseum in New Haven, Connecticut.
1982, The Grateful Dead’s only performance on this date took place at the University of Iowa Fieldhouse in Iowa City.
1984, Aerosmith appeared at the Cumberland County Civic Center, Portland, Maine.
1985,”Money for Nothing” by Dire Straits peaked at number four on the UK singles chart. Notable for its groundbreaking music video and a cameo appearance by Sting, who also co-wrote the song with Mark Knopfler, and sings the song’s falsetto introduction and backing chorus, “I want my MTV,” The video was also the first to be aired on MTV Europe when the network started on August 1st, 1987.
1985, Simon Le Bon from Duran Duran was air lifted to safety when his boat Drum overturned while racing off the English coast. Le Bon was trapped under the hull with five other crew members for twenty minutes, until being rescued by the Royal Navy.
1992, Def Leppard kicked off the North American leg on their 248-date Seven Day Weekend world Tour at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
1993, The Dave Matthews Band played at The Flood Zone in Richmond, Virginia, the gig was recorded with some of songs ending up on the band’s first album Remember Two Things.
2002, Lisa Marie Presley married actor Nicolas Cage at a resort in Hawaii. The marriage was Presley’s third. She was married previously to musician Danny Keough and pop star Michael Jackson. Cage filed for divorce four months later.
2002, Michael Houser, a founding member and lead guitarist of the band Widespread Panic, died at age 40 from complications due to pancreatic cancer, diagnosed earlier in the year.
2007, Anthony Wilson, the UK music mogul behind some of Manchester’s most successful bands, died at age 57, after suffering from kidney cancer. The TV presenter and entrepreneur founded Factory records, the label behind New Order and the Happy Mondays. He was also known for setting up the Hacienda nightclub in Manchester, England.
2008, Singer-songwriter Isaac Hayes died at his home in Memphis, Tennessee, at the age of 65. Police were called to his home after his wife found him unconscious. He was taken to hospital where he was pronounced dead. Hayes won an Oscar for the 1971 hit “Theme From Shaft” and was also known as the voice of Chef from the hit cartoon show, South Park. He was married four times and had 12 children.
Born on August 10: Clarence Leonidas “Leo” Fender, inventor of the Fender Telecaster (1909); Jimmy Dean (1928); Eddie Fisher (1929); Bobby Hatfield, singer, The Righteous Brothers (1940); Jimmy Griffin, singer, guitarist Bread, The Remingtons (1943); Ian Anderson, Jethro Tull (1947); Ronnie Spector, The Ronettes (1947); Mark Price, English drummer, All About Eve, Del Amitri (1959); Jon Farriss drummer, INXS (1961)
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Aerosmith, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Def Leppard, Dire Straits, Elton John, Elvis Presley, Eric Clapton, Isaac Hayes, Jimi Hendrix, John Denver, Kiss, Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, Queen, Simon & Garfunkel, T Rex, The Dave Matthews Band, The Grateful Dead, The Who, Thin Lizzy, Tom Jones, Van Halen, Yes.
