| 72 | years ago | 1954 | Neal Schon of Journey is born. |
| 70 | years ago | 1956 | Little Richard's first #1 R&B hit, Slippin' and Slidin', backed with Long Tall Sally, is released on Specialty. |
| 69 | years ago | 1957 | Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Johnny Van Zandt is born. |
| 59 | years ago | 1967 | In London, Pink Floyd record their first single, Arnold Layne, which will top the U.K. charts but won't do a thing in the U.S. |
| 56 | years ago | 1970 | Jefferson Airplane is fined $1,000 for using profanity during a show in Oklahoma City. |
| 52 | years ago | 1974 | Joni Mitchell has her biggest album with Court and Spark (#2), which turns gold on this date. The highest charting singles are Help Me (#7) and Free Man in Paris (#22). |
| 49 | years ago | 1977 | Royal Canadian Mounted Police raid Keith Richards' Toronto hotel suite while he is asleep and seize 22 grams of heroin, 5 grams of cocaine and narcotics paraphernalia. Richards is arrested, charged with possession of heroin with intent to traffic and possession of cocaine. He is released on $25,000 bail. Trial is set for October. With Richards previous arrests for various problems, fans and associates of the Rolling Stones fear this will the one that will bring an end to the 15-year-old band. |
| 46 | years ago | 1980 | The 22nd Annual Grammy Award winners for 1979 are announced. The Doobie Brothers' What a Fool Believes wins both Record and Song of the Year. Billy Joel's 52nd Street wins both Album of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance. |
| 45 | years ago | 1981 | The Police receive a gold record for Zenyatta Mondatta, their third LP and their most blatantly commercial. The first hit off the album is Da Doo Doo Doo, Da Da Da Da. |
| 42 | years ago | 1984 | The infamous Pepsi commercial in which Michael Jackson's hair caught on fire during the taping debuts on TV. |
| 36 | years ago | 1990 | Time Magazine quotes Milli Vanilli singer Rob Pilatus as saying, “musically, we're more talented than any Bob Dylan or Paul McCartney. Mick Jagger can't produce a sound. I'm the new Elvis.” |
| 35 | years ago | 1991 | Singer James Brown is granted an early parole and set free in Columbia, SC after serving time for leading police on a high speed chase through two states. |
| 22 | years ago | 2004 | Rolling Stone magazine reports that The Rolling Stones were 2003's richest rock stars, earning $84.1 million that year. Bruce Springsteen was second, with $81.7 million, and The Eagles third, with $62.9 million. |
| 22 | years ago | 2004 | Life-sized statues of the Blues Brothers stolen two weeks earlier from in front of the Ground Patti Jr. drive-through restaurant in Slidell, Louisiana are found blindfolded and tied-up in the woods north of Slidell. The restaurant owner paid an unidentified man a $500 reward for finding the statues and calling police. |
| 22 | years ago | 2004 | Whitney Houston's husband, singer Bobby Brown, is sentenced in Atlanta to 60 days in jail for a probation violation after allegedly hitting his wife. The probation stemmed from a 1996 guilty plea to a drunken-driving charge. |