2002 Madonna breaks The Beatles' record for most Top 10 hits on the Hot 100 when "Die Another Day" goes to #8, giving her 35 Top 10 hits on the chart.
2002 Eminem hits #1 on the Hot 100 for the first time when "Lose Yourself," from his movie 8 Mile, tops the chart.
1999 The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) announces the biggest-selling artists of the century in the United States: The Beatles have sold the most albums (106 million), Garth Brooks is the best-selling male solo act, and Barbra Streisand the best-selling female. Elton John's 1997 "Candle In The Wind" is the best-selling single of the century, and the best-selling album is the Eagles' Greatest Hits 1971-1975.
1993 The first Wu-Tang Clan album, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), is released. The album becomes a hardcore rap landmark and proof that a 9-man hip-hop collective can succeed.More
1985 The Miami Vice Theme hits #1 on the Hot 100, the last instrumental song to top the tally.More
1974 Bachman-Turner Overdrive become just the second Canadian band to hit #1 in America when "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" claims the top spot. The first to do it was another Randy Bachman band: The Guess Who, who topped the chart with "American Woman" in 1970.
1973 Billy Joel releases his second album, Piano Man. The title track, based on his nights performing at a piano bar in Los Angeles called The Executive Room, becomes his first hit when it peaks at #25 in America.
1967 The first issue of Rolling Stone magazine is published, with a photo of John Lennon on the cover and items about David Crosby, The Who and Country Joe McDonald (of Country Joe & the Fish).More
2015 Allen Toussaint dies at age 77. A giant in the New Orleans musician scene, he wrote "Southern Nights," which was a #1 hit for Glen Campbell in 1977.
2012 Soul singer Major Harris (of The Delfonics) dies of congestive heart and lung failure at age 65.
2010 A three-alarm fire in a warehouse where Neil Young stored everything from vintage cars to guitar cases causes damage estimated at about $800,000. The cause is promptly investigated, but fire officials say they don't find any evidence of arson.
2010 Chris Tomlin ties the knot with his long-term girlfriend, Lauren Bricken.
2010 Rapper Wiz Khalifa is arrested in Greenville, North Carolina, on drug charges after authorities smell marijuana coming from his tour bus. Police find 60 grams of pot after searching the vehicle. Khalifa is booked and released on a $300,000 bond. The rapper's lawyers are able to reduce the charge to personal possession and Khalifa avoids jail time.
2009 Gary Glitter suffers the ultimate indignation when he is executed for child rape in a Channel 4 TV dramatization.
2008 "Pata Pata" singer Miriam Makeba dies of a heart attack at age 76 after performing at a concert in Castel Volturno, Italy.
2006 At the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York, Alicia Keys and David Bowie perform "Changes" at a benefit for the Keep a Child Alive organization, which helps disadvantaged children in Africa. It is Bowie's final performance, as his health deteriorates and he withdraws from the public eye.
2004 Kenny Chesney is the big winner at the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards, held at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. Chesney, who had never won a CMA award, scores both the Entertainer of the Year and Album of the Year trophies. The latter is for his No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems set.
1999 Faith Hill releases her fourth album, Breathe. A huge crossover hit, it debuts at #1 in America and wins a Grammy Award for Best Country Album.
1998 Rick James suffers a stroke after a blood vessel ruptures in his neck while he is head banging during a performance in Denver, Colorado. A spokesman later comments, "The doctor called it a result of rock'n'roll neck, the repeated rhythmic whiplash motion of the head and neck."
1998 Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun and Bobby "Blue" Bland receive lifetime achievement awards from the Blues Foundation at a ceremony held at the House of Blues in West Hollywood.
1998 Michael Jackson settles a lawsuit over stories and pictures in the London Daily Mirror that say his face had been disfigured by cosmetic surgery. "The photographs were taken honestly and were not tampered with, but the Mirror has since met with the plaintiff in person and acknowledges that the photographs do not accurately represent the plaintiff's true appearance," says a lawyer for the publisher.
1996 For the first time, Bob Dylan licenses one of his songs for commercial use, in this case, "The Times They Are A Changin'" to the Bank of Montreal.
1993 R. Kelly releases his debut album, 12 Play. It peaks at #2 in America and holds the top spot on the R&B albums chart for nine weeks.
Fiona Apple releases her second album. The title is 90 words long, so it is usually listed as When The Pawn....
The album's full title is: When the pawn hits the conflicts he thinks like a king What he knows throws the blows when he goes to the fight And he'll win the whole thing 'fore he enters the ring There's no body to batter when your mind is your might So when you go solo, you hold your own hand And remember that depth is the greatest of heights And if you know where you stand, then you know where to land And if you fall it won't matter, cause you'll know that you're right It's a poem Apple wrote after seeing her 1997 Spin magazine interview, where the writer couldn't grasp that her personality was genuine, writing, "Before she has fully become a person, she has become a persona. It's taking her some time to decide which part of her is the image, and which part is real." This sets the mark for longest album title, but other acts take note of the ensuing publicity and beat it, notably Chumbawumba with their 160-word release known as The Boy Bands Have Won in 2008. As for the songs, they're a deep dive into Apple's psyche. The first single, "Fast As You Can," is a warning to any would-be suitors: "you want no part of this." "I Know," later covered by Elvis Costello, is about a guy who could keep up with her intellectually, but wasn't available. The three-year gap between When The Pawn... and Apple's debut album, Tidal, is only half the time she takes to release her next album, Extraordinary Machine, which appears in 2005 after deciding to re-record it completely.
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