Music History Events: Ambitious Endeavors
May 27, 2022 Abba's virtual reality show Voyages opens in London with digital avatars performing in place of the actual band members.More
July 26, 2015 In a field just outside of Cesena, Italy, 1000 musicians and singers play Foo Fighters "Learn to Fly" simultaneously with the dream of attracting the band to play a show in their city for the first time in nearly 20 years.More
November 8, 2014 As artists realize they can get paid to go on cruises, many take advantage of the opportunity, including the country duo Florida Georgia Line, who conveniently have a hit song called "Cruise."More
October 6, 2004 On his radio show, Howard Stern announces his move to satellite radio, where he will broadcast on Sirius, which gets a huge bump in subscribers. The move to satellite frees Stern from the shackles of the FCC, which doesn't regulate satellite. He and his crew are free to swear like sailors and talk dirty, which they often do. It also means fewer commercials.
February 29, 1992 U2 premiere their Zoo TV tour in Lakeland, Florida, making their first US concert appearance in four years and transforming the band into "an audio-visual idea."More
January 15, 1991 On the United Nations deadline for Iraq to remove troops from Kuwait, a new version of "Give Peace A Chance" is released, with contributions from Iggy Pop, Tom Petty, LL Cool J and dozens of others.More
July 21, 1990 With a bevy of special guests, Roger Waters performs The Wall at the former site of the Berlin Wall, which came down eight months earlier.More
June 19, 1987 Mötley Crüe begin their Girls, Girls, Girls tour with a show in Tucson, Arizona. The stage show features an inflatable Harley, lots of pyro, and a contraption that spins Tommy Lee and his drum kit upside down while he plays. Whitesnake is the opening act; later on the tour an new band called Guns N' Roses takes that slot.
May 25, 1986 It's Hands Across America, as millions of Americans form a human chain from New York to Santa Monica to raise money for hunger relief. The project is organized by the same guy who put together "We Are The World," but the theme song is far less ambitious.More
September 3, 1982 Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak throws the US Festival "for a few thousand friends" in hopes of uniting people through music and technology. A crowd of at least 200,000 shows up in the blistering heat of San Bernardino, California, for three days of music, tech-geekery, and dust... a whole lot of dust. Fleetwood Mac, performing for the first time in two years, headlines a bill that also includes The Police and the Grateful Dead.More
February 7, 1980 At the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, Pink Floyd stage the first production of The Wall, an immersive concert performance in which a giant wall is erected on stage as the band plays, representing the alienation between audience and performer.More
September 19, 1979 James Taylor, Jackson Browne, The Doobie Brothers, Graham Nash and Bonnie Raitt perform at Madison Square Garden for the first of five "no nukes" concerts.More
June 4, 1979 Fleetwood Mac record the USC Trojan Marching Band at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles for use in their song "Tusk," the title track to their first album since Rumours. A film crew captures the action (including Stevie Nicks deftly twirling a baton) which is made into the video for the song.More
August 20, 1977 The Voyager 2 space probe is launched, carrying with it a "Golden Record" of sounds and images representing Earth. More
October 26, 1976 The Mothership, a lander that descends to the stage when the band play "Mothership Connection," appears for the first time during P-Funk's show at the Municipal Auditorium in New Orleans.More
September 22, 1974 The Muhammad Ali vs. George Foreman boxing match (the "Rumble In The Jungle") in Zaire is postponed, but a concert festival promoting the event goes on anyway, with Bill Withers, The Spinners and Celia Cruz performing along with the African artist Tabu Ley Rochereau.More
August 1, 1971 George Harrison hosts the Concert For Bangladesh, the first major charity concert and the precursor to Live Aid. Guests include Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston and Ringo Starr.More
June 16, 1969 Experimental avant-garde/free-jazz artist Don Van Vliet, aka Captain Beefheart, releases Trout Mask Replica, a polyrhythmic, polytonal collection of noise that is either an unlistenable mess or a work of genius.More
February 25, 1968 The Jimi Hendrix Experience play two shows at the Civic Opera House in Chicago. Between shows, Hendrix gets "casted" by the inventive groupie Cynthia Plaster Caster, who makes a mold of his love gun.More
June 14, 1966 Deeming its "butcher cover" in poor taste, Capitol Records recalls the new Beatles album, Yesterday and Today, which is scheduled for release the next day and has already been sent to stores.More
January 8, 1957 Rock and roll comes to Australia when Bill Haley, LaVern Baker and The Platters kick off a tour at Newcastle Stadium that continues on to West Melbourne Stadium and Sydney Stadium. It's the first rock stadium show, pre-dating the Beatles Shea Stadium concert by eight years.
March 17, 2023 Taylor Swift launches her Eras tour in Glendale, Arizona. The three-hour show is divided into 10 acts dedicated to the music and looks of each of her previous albums. It's her first trek since her Reputation Tour five years and four albums earlier.
October 7, 1996 Pearl Jam fan Mark Zupan crowd surfs all the way to the stage at the band's concert at Fort Lauderdale Stadium... in a wheelchair! He goes on to captain the US wheelchair rugby team and appear in the movie Murderball.
October 23, 1981 In Honolulu, George Thorogood embarks on his 50/50 tour, playing 50 shows in 50 states on 50 consecutive nights. After a flight to Alaska and then to Portland, Oregon, the rest of it is one the road, finishing as scheduled in Pasadena, California.
July 15, 1968 The Beatles' new enterprise, Apple, enters its new corporate headquarters on 3 Savile Row, London, later the site of their famous "rooftop concert."
September 25, 1957 With $600 saved up from working at a gas station and doing maintenance at LSU, Buddy Guy leaves Louisiana and catches a train to Chicago, where he makes his mark in the blues.
February 2, 2019 Marshmello performs a virtual concert inside the online game Fortnite that is seen by an estimated 10 million gamers. To pull it off, he is rigged to a body-motion suit that transfers his movements to the screen. It's the first large-scale integration of a concert within a video game.
August 14, 2016 Nearing the end of a summer concert season where fans have been tailgating with improvised toilets, police in Mansfield, Massachusetts, warn they will not be tolerated at the upcoming Jimmy Buffett concert.More
August 26, 2014 Kate Bush, who hasn't toured since 1979, returns to the stage for a series of 22 shows at the Eventim Apollo in London. Titled Before The Dawn, it's an elaborate production with acting, a puppeteer, and an illusionist. The shows earn rave reviews and, the next week, eight of her albums return to the Top 40 of the UK albums chart.
October 28, 1997 The Flaming Lips release their eighth album, Zaireeka, a four-CD collection designed to play on four separate audio systems at once. Frontman Wayne Coyne notes, "It was and is 'surround sound' for the extreme fanatic."
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