2 JUNE
In Music History
1962 Thor Eldon Jonsson (guitarist for The Sugarcubes) is born in Iceland.
1962 Ray Charles' "I Can't Stop Loving You" hits #1 for the first of five weeks.
1960 Tony Hadley (lead singer of Spandau Ballet) is born in Islington, London, England.
1960 Bobby Darin plays the Copacabana in New York for the first time.
1958 Alan Freed, who popularized R&B music by playing it for a white audience, moves from WINS in New York to WABC. Freed put on a lot of concerts featuring the artists he played, and WINS had suspended him over a show in Boston where a riot broke out.
1958 Barry Sadler joins the US Air Force (he's later a Green Beret in the US Army).
1957 Johnnie Ray's "Yes Tonight Josephine" hits #1 on the UK singles chart.
1955 Michael Steele (bass guitarist for The Bangles) is born Susan Nancy Thomas in Pasadena, California. She is an early member of The Runaways, an all-girl punk rock group.
1952 Pete Farndon (bassist for The Pretenders) is born in Hereford, England.
1951 Steve Brookins (drummer for .38 Special from 1974-1987) is born.
1945 The Les Brown Orchestra with Doris Day goes to #1 in America with "Sentimental Journey."
1945 Soul singer Chubby Tavares (of Tavares) is born Antone Lee Tavares in Providence, Rhode Island.
1941 R&B singer William Guest (of Gladys Knight & The Pips) is born in Atlanta, Georgia.
1941 The Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts is born Charles Robert Watts in London.
1937 Jimmy Jones, known for the 1960 rock and roll hit "Handy Man," is born in Birmingham, Alabama.
Whitney Houston Releases Hit-Filled Second Album
1987Whitney Houston's second album, Whitney, is released. It contains four #1 hits, including the enduring "I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)."
Read more2 JUNE
Featured Events
2020 The music industry recognizes "Blackout Tuesday" in response to the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. Using the hashtag #TheShowMustBePaused, many record labels and artists cease operations, while broadcasters and streaming services change their programming in support of efforts to address racism and injustice on a wide scale, and more specifically to end police brutality against African Americans.More
2018 BTS become the first K-pop band to top the US albums chart when Love Yourself: Tear debuts at #1.
2006 Muscle Shoals Sound Studios is added to the National Historic Register.More
2002 Eminem's The Eminem Show hits #1 on both the UK and US album charts.
2001 A cover of the chart-topping 1974 Labelle hit "Lady Marmalade" by Christina Aguilera, Missy Elliott, Pink, Mya and Lil' Kim takes the song back to the top spot, making Lil' Kim the first female rapper to appear on a Hot 100 #1 hit.
1989 Rolling Stones bass player Bill Wyman, 52, marries 18-year-old Mandy Smith in a 15-minute civil ceremony held at a registry office in Suffolk, England. The only witnesses are Smith's sister and Wyman's son. A proper celebration takes place three days later.More
1944 Marvin Hamlisch is born in New York City. The composer will not only win a Pulitzer Prize for Drama for A Chorus Line in 1975, but will snag multiple Emmy, Grammy, Tony, and Academy Awards for his work for stage and screen (The Way We Were, The Sting).
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