Today in Rock History – October 14

Rock History October 14

1965, The Rolling Stones, The Spencer Davis Group, Unit 4 Plus 2, The Checkmates, The Habit, The End and Charlie Dickins all appeared at The Odeon, Birmingham during a UK tour.

Spencer Davis Group

1966, Pink Floyd and Soft Machine appeared at the London Free School All Saints Hall, Notting Hill, London.

1966, The Who performed at Queens Hall in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.

1967, Cream appeared at the Grande Ballroom, Detroit, Michigan.

1967, Bobbie Gentry started a two-week run at number one on the album chart with Ode To Billie Joe.

1967, Pink Floyd performed at Caesars Club in Bedford England.

1967, The second series of The Monkees TV show started on BBC TV in the UK. Plans for the shows to be screened in color were dropped, so it was aired in black & white.

1967, The Who’s “I Can See For Miles” backed with “Someone’s Coming” is released in Britain. Pete Townshend had held the song back for over a year until The Who would need a surefire hit single. Incredibly, this masterful recording ends up tying with “Anyway Anyhow Anywhere” as the poorest charting to date of The Who’s official U.K. singles, peaking at number ten.

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1968, Yes played at the Revolution Club, London.

1968, Pink Floyd began two days in the studio working on “Point Me At The Sky” and “Careful With That Axe, Eugene” at Abbey Road Studios, London.

1968, The Jackson Five make their national TV debut on ABC TV’s Hollywood Palace.

1969, Police in New Jersey issued a warrant for the arrest of Frank Sinatra in relation to his connections with the Mafia.

1970, The Allman Brothers Band performed at the Leon Cole Auditorium at Jacksonville State University, in Jacksonville, Florida.

1971, Music publishing firm Arco Industries filed a $500,000 dollar lawsuit against Creedance Clearwater Revival’s John Fogerty, claiming that Fogerty’s song “Travelin’ Band” contained substantial material copied from Little Richard’s “Good Golly, Miss Molly.” The suit was eventually dropped.

1972, Joe Cocker was arrested for possession of drugs after a show in Adelaide, Australia.

1972, Michael Jackson went to number one on the singles chart with “Ben,” his first solo song to top the charts.

1973, Queen appeared at Le Blow Up in Luxembourg.

1974, Roxy Music played at Winter Gardens, Bournemouth, England.

1975, Roxy Music performed at Belle Vue, Manchester, England.

The Grateful Dead in 1976

1976, Aerosmith kicked off their first ever UK tour at Liverpool’s Empire Theatre.

1976, The Grateful Dead played at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.

1977, Rush performed at the Assembly Center, Tulsa, Oklahoma.

1978, Bob Dylan appeared at the Hulman Civic University Center, Terre Haute, Indiana.

1980, Black Sabbath played at the Capital Centre, Landover, Maryland.

1981, King Crimson performed at Stadthalle Muehlheim, Cologne, Germany.

1982, Van Halen appeared at the Civic Arena, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

1983, Iron Maiden played at the Hollywood Sportatorium, Pembroke Pines, Florida.

1988, Def Leppard became first act in chart history to sell seven million copies of two consecutive LPs, with Pyromania, their third studio album released in 1983, and Hysteria, which became the band’s best-selling album to date. It sold over 20 million copies worldwide, and spawned six hit singles.

1989, Motley Crue started a two-week run atop on the US album charts with Dr. Feelgood.

1990, Multi-Emmy and Grammy award-winning American composer, pianist, conductor, and music lecturer Leonard Bernstein died of pneumonia. Composed music for the 1957 musical West Side Story, and the film On The Waterfront. Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic aged 25 after guest conductor Bruno Walter came down with the flu.  In addition, he wrote three symphonies, two operas, five musicals, and numerous other pieces.

2004, Eric Clapton was suspended from driving in France after being caught speeding at 134 mph in his Porsche 911 Turbo near Merceuil. He was given a 750 euro (£515, $975) fine and his UK licence was confiscated. After paying his fine Clapton, posed for photographs with French police and then left the scene in his Porsche, with his secretary behind the wheel.

2006, Freddy Fender, the Tex-Mex singer, died of complications from lung cancer at the age of 69. He was known for standards as “Before the Next Teardrop Falls, ” a US number one in 1975,  and “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights.”

2014, Isaiah “Ikey” Owens, the American keyboardist known for his work with The Mars Volta, Jack White and an array of bands from the Long Beach music scene, died aged 39. Owens was found dead due to a heart attack in his hotel room in Puebla, Mexico.

Born on October 13: Cliff Richard (1940); Colin Hodgkinson, bass, Whitesnake (1945); Justin Hayward (1946);  Thomas Dolby (1958); Natalie Maines, singer, songwriter, Dixie Chicks (1974)

Get more Today in Rock History

Aerosmith, Bob Dylan, Bobbie Gentry, Def Leppard, Freddy Fender, Iron Maiden, John Fogerty, Leonard Bernstein, Michael Jackson, Pink Floyd, Queen, Roxy Music, Rush, Spencer Davis Group, The Grateful Dead, The Monkees, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Van Halen.