Behind the Boss – Summer 2021
August 1, 2021
This week in Rock and Roll History, Sept 5-11
September 9, 2021
It’s Throwback Thursday! Here’s what happened this week in Boss rock n’ roll history.
On 29 August 1966, the Beatles played their last concert before a paying audience — a sold-out crowd of 25,000 — at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California. In 1977 on this day, three people were arrested in Memphis after trying to steal Elvis’ body. As a result, his remains would be moved to Graceland.
On 30 Aug. 1969, the 3-day Texas Pop Festival began, featuring Janis Joplin, Led Zeppelin, Sam & Dave, Santana, Johnny Winter, Grand Funk Railroad, Delaney & Bonnie, Nazz, Spirit, B.B. King, Canned Heat, and Chicago. And American pioneering female country music singer Ellen Muriel Deason, known as Kitty Wells, was born this day in 1919. Her 1952 hit, ‘It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels,’ made her the first female country singer to top the U.S. country charts and turned her into the first female country star.
On 31 Aug. 2004, U.K. medical magazine Thorax issued a warning to music fans that listening to loud music in the car can give you a collapsed lung. One 19-year-old had been treated in Bristol after his left lung collapsed as his 1,000-watt bass box boomed out in his Fiat Panda.
On 1 September 1976, ‘Wish You Were Here’ was close to spending one year on the U.K. chart. Pink Floyd’s ninth studio album, released in September 1975, was an instant success; record company EMI couldn’t press enough copies to satisfy demand. On this day in 1984, after a 25-year career, Tina Turner had her first solo No.1 single in the U.S. with ‘What’s Love Got To Do With It.’ And Harold Lloyd Jenkins was born today, September 1, 1933; you may know him as Conway Twitty. Twitty held the record for the most No. 1 singles of any act with 55 No. 1 Billboard country hits until George Strait broke the record in 2006.
On 2 September in 1964, on tour in the USA, the Beatles appeared at The Convention Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Days before the concert, Philadelphia had experienced race riots; The Beatles, who were Civil Rights supporters, were shocked to see that their audience of 13,000 was completely white. On this date in 1995, Michael Jackson went to No. 1 on the U.S. singles chart with a song written by R. Kelly: ‘You Are Not Alone.’ It holds a Guinness World Record as the first song in the 37-year history of the Billboard Hot 100 to debut at No. 1.
On 3 September 1966, Donovan went to No.1 on the U.S. singles chart with ‘Sunshine Superman,’ a No.2 hit in the U.K. The track featured then Yardbird and future Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page. Today in 2009, friends and family of Michael Jackson paid their last respects to the singer at a funeral held at Glendale’s Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Los Angeles. Dame Elizabeth Taylor, Quincy Jones, Macaulay Culkin, Berry Gordy, and Lisa Marie Presley were among the 200 invited guests. The singer’s family arrived in a motorcade of 31 vehicles; Jackson’s brothers — Randy, Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, and Marlon — acted as pallbearers, carrying Jackson’s gold-plated coffin.
On September 4, 1969, the film ‘Easy Rider,’ starring Jack Nicholson, Peter Fonda, and Dennis Hopper, opened at The Classic in London, England. The movie’s soundtrack featured The Band, The Jimi Hendrix Experience and Steppenwolf. And today in 1981, Beyonce was born. With Destiny’s Child she had the 2000 U.S. No. 1 single, ‘Say My Name,’ and the 2001 U.S. & U.K. No.1 single and album, ‘Survivor.’ She’s won 22 Grammy Awards and is the most nominated woman in the award’s history.
