| 86 years ago (1938) | Soul singer Bobby Hebb is born in Nashville, Tennessee. |
| 84 years ago (1940) | Singer Dobie Gray is born in Simonton, Texas. |
| 83 years ago (1941) | Soul singer Brenton Wood is born Alfred Jesse Smith in Shreveport, Louisiana. All his hits will come in 1967: The Oogum Boogum Song, Baby You Got It, and Gimme Little Sign. Other music stars born today include Darlene Love (Hawthorne, California), and Neil Landon (of The Flowerpot Men and Fat Mattress), who is born in Kirdford, Sussex, England. |
| 81 years ago (1943) | Mick Jagger, lead singer for the Rolling Stones, is born. |
| 75 years ago (1949) | Roger Taylor, drummer for Queen, is born. |
| 74 years ago (1950) | Singer/keyboardist Duncan Mackay of 10cc is born in Leeds, Yorkshire, England. |
| 72 years ago (1952) | Rosemary Clooney's Half As Much hits #1. |
| 64 years ago (1960) | Sam Cooke releases Chain Gang. |
| 64 years ago (1960) | Rock singer/songwriter Gary Cherone of Extreme and Van Halen is born in Malden, Massachusetts. |
| 64 years ago (1960) | Hank Ballard and the Midnighters record Let's Go, Let's Go, Let's Go. |
| 61 years ago (1963) | Motown Records release Mickey's Monkey by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles. It peaks at #3 on the R&B charts and #8 on the pop chart. |
| 59 years ago (1965) | Beach Boys drummer Dennis Wilson marries Carol Freedman, the first of what would be four wives, in Los Angeles. |
| 58 years ago (1966) | The Monkees record "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone." |
| 57 years ago (1967) | Timothy "Headliner" Barnwell of the Hip-Hop ensemble Arrested Development is born in New Jersey. |
| 56 years ago (1968) | The Rolling Stones miss the scheduled release date for their album Beggar's Banquet because of their record label's objection to the album's cover design, which featured a graffiti-covered bathroom wall. Mick Jagger was incensed. It was also the first album on which Jagger played guitar. |
| 56 years ago (1968) | Jeannie C. Riley records Harper Valley P.T.A. |
| 56 years ago (1968) | The Jackson 5, discovered by Motown mainstay Gladys Knight (not, as legend has it, Diana Ross), signs to the label today for a one-year contract. |
| 55 years ago (1969) | Brian Jones, who was a founding member of The Rolling Stones, appears on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine following his death on July 3rd. |
| 55 years ago (1969) | The 5th Dimension's two lead singers, Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. are married. The duo will score their own hit in 1977 with You Don't Have To Be A Star (To Be In My Show). |
| 50 years ago (1974) | John Denver earns a gold record for his all-time biggest hit, Annie's Song. The song was written about his wife, who later divorced him. |
| 49 years ago (1975) | Nat King Cole's daughter, Natalie, debuts on the music charts with This Will Be. It makes it to #6 on the pop charts and #1 on the R&B. |
| 48 years ago (1976) | With endless touring and recording, as well as various addictions, tearing the band apart, Three Dog Night plays their last concert tonight in San Francisco, CA. The group would reunite in 1981, but that reunion would prove short-lived. They'e together again in 1999 for Jeff Fest in Metairie, Louisiana. |
| 48 years ago (1976) | Ted Nugent receives a gold record for his sixth, self-titled album. It includes Hey Baby and Dog Eat Dog. |
| 47 years ago (1977) | Elvis Costello is arrested while performing outside the London Hilton where a CBS Records sales conference is being held. Costello was trying to audition for a U.S. record deal. Costello was taken to the station and fined five British pounds. CBS execs invite Costello back for an audition. |
| 47 years ago (1977) | Two days after a concert at the Oakland Coliseum, Robert Plant learns today that his son Karac has died, which cancels the rest of their tour. The original Led Zeppelin never performs live in the US again. Their next stop would have been July 30 in the Louisiana Superdome. |
| 45 years ago (1979) | A revised version of the Clash's debut album is released in the States. This comes 2 years after the disc had been issued in their native Britain. |
| 45 years ago (1979) | An article in Rolling Stone says promotional videotapes are the newest selling tool in rock. It mentions David Bowie's Boys and Keep Swinging and Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody. |
| 44 years ago (1980) | Singer/Guitarist/Producer Dave “Brownsound” Baksh of Sum 41 and Organ Thieves is born in Ajax, Ontario, Canada. |
| 38 years ago (1986) | Peter Gabriel's Sledgehammer tops the U.S. singles charts for one week. |
| 37 years ago (1987) | With the Cold War winding down, American export Billy Joel plays a concert in Leningrad - something that would be impossible a few years earlier. The show is released as the album KOHUEPT (Concert). |
| 32 years ago (1992) | Singer Mary Wells, known for her hits My Guy and You Beat Me To The Punch, dies of cancer at age 49. |
| 32 years ago (1992) | Kiss guitarist Paul Stanley marries model Pamela Bowen in Los Angeles. |
| 24 years ago (2000) | The file-sharing service Napster is ordered by a US federal judge to cease trading copyrighted music files in the next 48 hours. |
| 21 years ago (2003) | Vegas mainstay Tom Jones in inducted into the Gaming Hall Of Fame, along with Harrah's exec Phil Satre. |
| 21 years ago (2003) | Limp Bizkit appear at the Hawthorne Racetrack in Chicago as part of Metallica's Summer Sanitarium tour with Deftones, Linkin Park and Mudvayne. But the crowd soon shows how they feel about frontman Fred Durst and his crew: Limp Bizkit are reportedly booed as soon as they hit the stage. It gets worse from there as Durst is pelted with coins and bottles, leading him to launch into homophobic taunts, according to local papers. As a result, Limp Bizkit leaves the stage after 30 minutes and only six songs, but not before Durst challenges audience members to a fight. |
| 18 years ago (2006) | Laurel, Mississippi native Lance Bass, the former 'N Sync heartthrob, reveals that he is gay in an exclusive interview with People magazine. “I knew that I was in this popular band and I had four other guys' careers in my hand, and I knew that if I ever acted on it or even said (that I was gay), it would overpower everything,” says Bass, referring to bandmates Joey Fatone, Chris Kirkpatrick, JC Chasez and Justin Timberlake, and his reason for staying in the closet until now. |
| 18 years ago (2006) | Arvel Jett Reeves is sentenced to eight months in jail for “bugging” Michael Jackson’s Gulfstream jet with two digital video recorders in order to get some media-worthy private conversation. |
| 12 years ago (2012) | Searching For Sugar Man, an Academy Award-winning documentary about Detroit Rocker Sixto “Sugar Man” Rodriguez, is released in the UK. |
| 11 years ago (2013) | Singer/songwriter J. J. Cale dies. His After Midnight and Cocaine were huge for Eric Clapton. |