| 81 | years ago | 1944 | Gladys Knight is born, as is Billy Vera. |
| 80 | years ago | 1945 | John Fogerty, guitarist and vocalist for Creedence Clearwater Revival, is born. |
| 70 | years ago | 1955 | The Ballad of Davy Crockett is the most popular song in the United States. Billboard refers to the tune as “disc entity” and reports if the sales of the other versions were all added up, including the original done by Fess Parker, more than 18 million copies have been bought in six months. |
| 63 | years ago | 1962 | Fine Young Cannibals lead singer Roland Gift is born. |
| 59 | years ago | 1966 | Ike and Tina Turner's River Deep, Mountain High is released. It stays on the chart for four weeks and reaches as high as #88. The record's producer Phil Spector considers the song the high point of his legendary production career and is so embittered by it not doing well in America that he would go into seclusion for two years. |
| 59 | years ago | 1966 | The Temptation's Ain't Too Proud to Beg is released and enters the Hot 100, where it will stay for thirteen weeks, peaking at #13. It will later be covered by the Rolling Stones on their album It's Only Rock n' Roll, and will be a hit for them as well. |
| 57 | years ago | 1968 | Singer Kylie Minogue is born. |
| 56 | years ago | 1969 | Rolling Stone Mick Jagger and girlfriend Marianne Faithful are arrested in their London home on marijuana possession charges. |
| 55 | years ago | 1970 | The film, Performance, starring Mick Jagger, premiers in New York. It was edited to exclude some particularly violent scenes that caused half the audience at the San Francisco premiere to walk out two months earlier. |
| 54 | years ago | 1971 | The James Gang releases Walk Away. |
| 48 | years ago | 1977 | Bruce Springsteen and his former manager Mike Appel reach an out of court settlement on Springsteen's year long suit and Appel's countersuit. All the legal action has kept Springsteen from recording for almost a year. He begins recording Darkness On The Edge Of Town immediately. |
| 48 | years ago | 1977 | Heart's Barracuda is released. |
| 48 | years ago | 1977 | Singer-actor John Davidson escapes a fire at the Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate, Kentucky, which kills 164 people and injures 130. Davidson stays to help the victims. |
| 42 | years ago | 1983 | The US Festival opens in San Bernardino, on the site of what is now the Blockbuster Arena. The Festival loses millions of dollars, mainly because of the large fees paid to the performers, including Van Halen and David Bowie. |
| 39 | years ago | 1986 | Viewers of Dick Clark's America Picks the #1 Songs choose Bill Haley's Rock Around the Clock, Simon & Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water and Lionel Richie's All Night Long as the greatest hits of the rock era. |
| 29 | years ago | 1996 | Depeche Mode lead singer Dave Gahan is arrested after allegedly overdosing on a speedball of cocaine and heroin at the L.A. Sunset Marquis hotel on the Strip. |
| 28 | years ago | 1997 | Word is released that Bob Dylan entered a New York hospital after suffering from severe chest pains. He is diagnosed with Histoplamosis -- a potentially fatal infection which creates swelling in the sac which surrounds the heart. |
| 17 | years ago | 2008 | Madonna and husband Guy Ritchie adopt a two-year-old Malawian boy, David. Madonna finances her own and six other orphanges in the country. The couple has two other children, Rocco, 7, and Lourdes, 11. |