1954 : Elvis Presley recorded ‘Blue Moon of Kentucky’, (the B-side for his first single) at Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee. Presley had recorded the A-side ‘That’s Alright’ four days earlier.

1955 : Bill Haley and the Comets’ Rock Around The Clock becomes the first Rock song to hit #1 – it stays there for 8 weeks. The song was originally released as a the B-side of “Thirteen Women,” but became a massive hit after it appeared in the film Blackboard Jungle.

1956 : After the June 30th trouble at Asbury Park, Bill Haley and His Comets are denied permission to play at the Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City. A city ordnance was passed that read: “Rock and roll music encouraged juvenile delinquency and inspired young females in lewd bathing suits to perform obscene dances on the city’s beaches.”

1956 : In the broadcast equivalent of Lou Gehrig taking over for Wally Pipp at first base, Dick Clark replaces Bob Horn as host of the TV show Bandstand, which runs on the Philadelphia TV station WFIL. The show went national the next year, and Clark continued hosting it until 1989.

1957 : Elvis Presley’s second film, Loving You, has its US premiere (Elvis does not attend since he got a special showing the night before).

1962 : Bob Dylan recorded Blowin’ In the Wind at Columbia Recording Studios in New York City during an afternoon session. Dylan originally wrote and performed a two-verse version of the song, as in its first public performance, at Gerde’s Folk City on April 16th, 1962. Shortly after this, he added the middle verse.

1966 : Rod Allen, lead vocalist and bassist for English group The Fortunes (“You’ve Got Your Troubles” and “Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again”), is pulled from the stage by frenzied fans during a gig in Lincoln, NE, and sent to the hospital with minor injuries.

1967 : On a US tour supporting The Monkees, The Jimi Hendrix Experience appear at the Convention Hall, Miami, Florida. After it becomes plainly apparent that the group is not suited to teenybopper audiences, the tour’s promoter Dick Clark and Hendrix’s manager Chas Chandler concoct a story saying that the conservative Daughters of the American Revolution group had complained at Jimi’s act and so the Experience left the tour after just six shows.

1968 : David Ruffin is fired from The Temptations after missing a show. The lead singer on their hits My Girl and Ain’t Too Proud To Beg, Ruffin clashed with his bandmates and with Motown head Berry Gordy before he was fired.

1969 : Working at Abbey Road studios in London The Beatles recorded ‘Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.’ John Lennon returned to the studio after recovering from a car crash in Scotland, and a bed was installed in the Abbey Road studio for Yoko, who was pregnant, and who had been more seriously injured in the car accident.

1969 : John Lennon’s Give Peace A Chance marks his solo debut on the U.K. charts.

1972 : Paul McCartney and Wings played their very first show in the small French town of Chateauvillon. The band included Denny Laine, Denny Seiwell, Henry McCullough and Paul’s wife, Linda. It was McCartney’s first time on the road since the Beatles quit touring in 1966. The band traveled on a double Decker London bus with a psychedelic interior.

1974 : Crosby Stills Nash & Young kicked off a reunion tour in Seattle in front of 15,000 fans.

1976 : The Pretty Things, Supercharge and third on the bill The Sex Pistols all appeared at The Lyceum, London, England, tickets £1.75.

1977 : Elvis Costello quit his day job at Elizabeth Arden Cosmetics to become a full time musician.

1983 : The Police started an eight week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Every Breath You Take’ also No.1 in the UK. Taken from the bands album Synchronicity, Sting won Song of the Year and The Police won Best Pop Performance for the song at the 1984 Grammy Awards.

1983 : Wham! went to No.1 on the UK album chart with their debut release ‘Fantastic!’, which went on to spend 116 weeks on the chart.

1988 : Cheap Trick went to No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘The Flame’, the group’s only US No.1.

1988 : Glenn Medeiros was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Nothing’s Gonna Change My Love For You’. The 18 year old from Hawaii was one of the youngest males to reach the top of the charts.

1989 : New Edition’s production manager was charged with criminal homicide after allegedly shooting the support acts security man after they ran over their stage time.

1995 : The Grateful Dead give their last concert with leader Jerry Garcia at Chicago’s Soldier Field. Jerry would die of a heart attack a month later while in drug rehab.

1999 : A statement was issued by Jerry Hall’s lawyers saying that she had formally agreed to separate from husband Mick Jagger after more than 8 years of marriage.

1999 : Elton John had a pacemaker fitted in an operation at a London hospital following reports about his ill health. Sir Elton was forced to cancel a series of concerts.

2004 : David Bowie was forced to cancel a string of European shows after emergency heart surgery. The 57 year-old singer had an operation last month in Germany, where he was on tour, to treat “an acutely blocked artery”. The star’s cancellation last month of 11 European dates was originally attributed to a shoulder injury.

2007 : Happy Mondays’ frontman Shaun Ryder was in trouble after he smoked several cigarettes on stage during a concert at The Ritz in Manchester. Smoking had been banned in all enclosed public places in England on 1 July of this year, and anyone flouting the law faced a £50 fine. Performers were only exempt from the smoking ban if the “artistic integrity” of their act required it.

2010 : During a Santana concert at First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre in Tinley Park, Illinois, guitarist Carlos Santana proposed to his girlfriend, Cindy Blackman who had just finished a drum solo during the band’s set. The couple married in December 2010.