Rock & Roll History – January 26
A good song is timeless. It doesn’t matter whether it’s trendy or hip right now or not. If a song is good and it makes you feel something, that’s it.
~Eddie Van Halen
1939 – The late Marshall Lieb of the Teddy Bears (‘To Know Him Is To Love Him’) was born.
1944 – Merrilee Rush (‘Angel Of The Morning’) was born and is celebrating her 72nd birthday.
1955 – Eddie Van Halen (guitar/songwriter with Van Halen – ‘Eruption’) was born. He’s 61 today.
1956 – Buddy Holly recorded ‘Blue Days, Black Nights’, ‘Don’t Come Back Knockin’n, and ‘Love Me’ at Owen Bradley’s Barn Studio in Nashville, Tennessee.
1964 – Barbra Streisand released ‘People’. The single peaked at #5 on the Billboard pop chart.
1969 – The Beatles recorded Paul McCartney’s ‘The Long And Winding Road’.
Rock Factoid: A second recording was done five days later but it was the recording from January 26 which formed the basis for the ‘Let It Be’ version.
When Phil Spector came to work on the Let It Be tracks in April 1970, he overdubbed strings and a choir, arranged and conducted by Richard Hewson. It was the use of strings and a female choir that enraged songwriter Paul McCartney, who said, “No one had asked me what I thought. I couldn’t believe it. I would never have female voices on a Beatles record.”
1970 – Simon & Garfunkel released the ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ single and the album of the same name.
Rock Factoid: The album, the fifth and final studio album by the duo, won Grammy Awards for Album of the Year, and for Best Engineered Recording, while the title track won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year, Song of the Year, Contemporary Song of the Year and Instrumental Arrangement of the Year.
1970 – Three Dog Night released ‘Celebrate’. It was the third single from their ‘Suitable For Framing’ album, which had been released in 1969.
1970 – Chicago released their second studio album, cleverly calling it ‘Chicago’ and not Chicago II because the first had been called ‘Chicago Transit Authority’ – which had been the band’s name before they were forced to change when the actual Chicago Transit Authority threatened legal proceedings.
Rock Factoid: It is considered by many to be Chicago’s breakthrough album, yielding three Top 10 hits; ‘Make Me Smile’ (#9), ‘Colour My World’ (#7), and ’25 or 6 To 4′ (#4).
1977 – The Beatles’ nine-year contract with EMI expired. Paul McCartney remained with EMI, George Harrison moved to A&M, Ringo Starr signed with Atlantic (in the U.S.) and Polydor (everywhere else). John Lennon did not sign a new contract and began his five-year hiatus from music.
1977 – Peter Green, the first lead guitarist of Fleetwood Mac, and founder of the group was committed to a psychiatric institution in England for observation. Green, who left the group in May, 1970, had threatened accountant Clifford Adams with an air rifle when Adams attempted to deliver a $51,000 royalty check to Green.
1986 – Allen Collins, guitarist with Lynyrd Skynyrd, crashed his car in Jacksonville, Florida, paralyzing him from the waist down and killing his girlfriend Debra Jean Watts.
1989 – Donnie Elbert (‘Where Did Our Love Go’) died of a stroke at the age of 52
2011 – Gladys Horton (The Marvelettes – ‘Please Mr. Postman’) died from complications of a stroke in Los Angeles at the age of 65.
Compiled by Ray Lemire ©2016 RayLemire.com. All Rights Reserved.