12 JANUARY
Featured Events
2010 Vampire Weekend release their second album, Contra, which goes to #1 in America. The cover girl is an unwilling subject, leading to a lawsuit.More
2003 While awaiting emergency surgery for a strangulated intestine, Maurice Gibb of the Bee Gees dies unexpectedly of a heart attack at age 53.More
1999 Britney Spears releases her first album, ...Baby One More Time.More
1998 The 13th Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremonies are held in New York. Inductees include the Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, The Mamas & The Papas, Lloyd Price, Santana, and Gene Vincent.
1993 At the eighth annual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, Cream, Ruth Brown, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Doors, Frankie Lymon & the teenagers, Etta James, Van Morrison, and Sly & the Family Stone are welcomed into the hall. Cream reunite on stage, but Morrison skips the ceremony, becoming the first living inductee to do so.More
1991 "I Touch Myself" by Australian new wave girl group Divinyls hits #1 on the Australian ARIA chart, #4 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, and #10 on the UK charts. This is a landmark event, as the song deals very frankly with female libido and sexual desire - not just as the passive object of a male.
1974 Steve Miller's "The Joker" hits #1 in the US, leaving many to wonder what exactly is the "pompatus of love."
1959 Berry Gordy, who had a hit as a songwriter with "Lonely Teardrops," launches the Tamla Record Company with $800 he borrowed from his family. A year later, he changes the label's name to Motown Records.
12 JANUARY
In Music History
2023 Lisa Marie Presley, the only child of Elvis, dies of cardiac arrest at 54.
2018 The movie Proud Mary opens in theaters with the tagline, "killing for the Man every night and day." John Fogerty is not pleased, tweeting his disapproval.More
2014 Beautiful: The Carole King Musical opens on Broadway. It wins a Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album and is nominated for a Tony Award for Best Musical.
2013 The 1974 Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow used by Freddie Mercury until his death in November 1991 is sold at an auction for £74,000 to a Russian businessman. It comes with a box of Kleenex Mansize tissues left in the car by the Queen frontman.
2013 Black Sabbath, complete with their newly reunited original frontman Ozzy Osbourne, announce the upcoming release of the album 13, the first Black Sabbath album in 18 years (since 1995's Forbidden).
2012 Lou Reed and John Cale of The Velvet Underground sue the Andy Warhol Foundation for licensing the iconic banana logo Warhol created for the band to third parties.
2004 Randy VanWarmer, who had a hit in 1979 with "Just When I Needed You Most," dies of leukemia at age 48.
2002 Saturday Night Live skewers the uproar over the rumor that 'N Sync will be appearing in the latest installment of the Star Wars franchise, Attack of the Clones. The skit features an over-the-top cameo by the boy band, including Jimmy Fallon as Justin Timberlake, singing their hit "Bye Bye Bye" and a Star Wars-themed ballad about being a "Jedi knight in these Jedi days."
2002 Adam Ant, suffering from manic depression, is arrested after bringing a starter pistol to a London pub and threatening to shoot customers. He left to get the pistol after some patrons were poking fun at him for his clothing.
1995 The 10th Annual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremonies are held in New York. Inductees include The Allman Brothers Band, Al Green, Janis Joplin, Led Zeppelin, Martha and the Vandellas, Neil Young, and Frank Zappa.
1993 Zayn Malik, the first One Direction member to go solo, is born in East Bowling, Bradford, England.
1992 The Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger and wife Jerry Hall have their third child, Georgia May Ayeesha.
1990 Bob Dylan plays the longest show of his career, performing 50 songs over four hours and 20 minutes at the club Toad's Place in New Haven, Connecticut. One of the songs in his set is "Dancing In The Dark," the only time Dylan covers a Bruce Springsteen song.
1981 The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) donates several rock albums to the Library of Congress, including Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde and KISS' Alive!
1977 Stephen Stills and Neil Young's album Long May You Run is certified Gold.
Led Zeppelin Release Debut Album
1969Led Zeppelin's self-titled debut album is released in America.
When his group The Yardbirds broke up, Jimmy Page formed a new band with bass player John Paul Jones (like Page, known for his work as a session musician), upstart singer Robert Plant, and explosive drummer John Bonham. On a Scandinavian tour where they called themselves "The New Yardbirds," they came up with songs for their debut album, using a few folk and blues tunes by other artists as a starting point. With no record deal but plenty of confidence, they quickly recorded the album in London on the cheap with funding supplied by Page and their manager, Peter Grant. The strategy pays off when Atlantic Records signs them in November. A British band, they set out to make their mark in America instead of focusing their efforts on England, a strategy that finds them opening for Vanilla Fudge in when they begin the tour on December 26, 1968. Radio stations along the way are given copies of "Good Times, Bad Times" to spur interest, but no Zeppelin material is available for purchase until the album is released two weeks into their tour. The album, made in about 30 hours for roughly $2,500, goes on to sell over 8 million copies in America and many more worldwide. "Dazed And Confused," based on a song of the same name by the folk singer Jake Holmes, is the centerpiece, taking up 15 minutes on the album and a lot more when they perform it live, including a section where Page plays his guitar with a violin bow. "Good Times, Bad Times" is issued as a single in March - one of the few singles the band puts out in America. In the UK, the album is released on March 31 while the band is on tour there.
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