Calendar Search Results: this is it
June 29, 1987 Meeting at a London pub, a group of record label executives decide to use the term "World Music" to promote their international artists. This new designation becomes a section in many record stores and makes it much easier to classify artists that don't fit traditional genres.
May 17, 1987 Tom Petty's home in Encino, California, burns to the ground. Petty and his family escape unharmed, but are traumatized by the blaze, which is determined to be arson. The perpetrator is never caught.More
April 13, 1987 Fleetwood Mac release Tango In The Night, their first album since Mirage five years earlier. Guitarist Lindsey Buckingham, who produced the album and had a hand in writing seven of the 12 songs, leaves before they tour.More
March 17, 1987 Reacting to a Beastie Boys concert three weeks earlier where the group used a giant inflatable penis as a stage prop and encouraged girls in the crowd to bare their breasts, the city of Columbus, Georgia passes an anti-lewdness law prohibiting nudity, simulated sex, and objectionable language at any show attended by minors.More
October 27, 1986 David Byrne, who has recently directed the movie True Stories (with a soundtrack by his band, Talking Heads), makes the cover of Time magazine under the headline "Rock's Renaissance Man."More
September 6, 1986 Bananarama's cover of "Venus" hits #1 in the US, bringing the English pop trio international fame. The song marks the group's first collaboration with the up-and-coming production team Stock, Aitken and Waterman.More
August 22, 1986 The movie Stand By Me is released in theaters. It's based on a novella by Stephen King called The Body, but director Rob Reiner decides to name it after the famous song to play up the friendship storyline and keep it from sounding like a slasher film.More
July 19, 1986 Genesis have their first (and only) #1 Hot 100 hit as "Invisible Touch" tops the chart.More
July 4, 1986 Run-DMC release their rap version of "Walk This Way" featuring Steven Tyler and Joe Perry of Aerosmith, the group that released the original version in 1975. It's the first major collaboration between rappers and rockers, proof positive that the styles can work together. Both groups get a huge boost when the song becomes a hit; for Aerosmith, it launches a comeback.
May 22, 1986 Cher, making her first appearance on David Letterman's show, tells him why she declined the many invitations to come on before: Because she thought he was an "a--hole."More
May 15, 1986 Run-DMC release their Raising Hell album, featuring the groundbreaking rap reworking of "Walk This Way." It's the first rap album to go Platinum and also the first to crack the Top 10, climbing to #3.
April 26, 1986 Van Halen prove there is life after David Lee Roth as their album 5150, their first with Sammy Hagar, hits #1 in the US for the first of three weeks.More
March 15, 1986 Starship's "Sara" hits #1 on the Hot 100. It's the second chart-topper (following "We Built This City") for the third iteration of the group, which was previously Jefferson Airplane and Jefferson Starship.
March 9, 1986 Steven Tyler and Joe Perry of Aerosmith go to Magic Ventures Studios in New York, where they record parts of their song "Walk This Way" so Run-D.M.C. can transform it into a hip-hop jam. Neither act is thrilled about the collaboration (Run-D.M.C.'s producer Rick Rubin spearheaded the effort), but the resulting track is a huge hit, revitalizing Aerosmith's career and delivering a new (mostly white) audience to the rappers.
February 28, 1986 The movie Pretty In Pink, based on the Psychedelic Furs song but with a very distorted interpretation of the lyric, is released in theaters.More
February 26, 1986 Thanks to their hit "West End Girls," Pet Shop Boys land the cover of Smash Hits magazine, which their frontman, Neil Tennant, used to write for.More
January 20, 1986 After years of campaigning to make Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday a federal holiday, Stevie Wonder commemorates the occasion with a star-studded concert celebration in Washington, D.C.More
November 16, 1985 "We Built This City" by Starship hits #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. It is later named Worst Song of All Time by Blender magazine.More
September 19, 1985 Frank Zappa, John Denver and Dee Snider of Twisted Sister testify at a Senate hearing where the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) argue for a ratings system on music. The musicians explain that this is censorship, but the PMRC wins a victory and warning labels are ordered on albums containing explicit lyrics.More
August 16, 1985 Red Hot Chili Peppers release the cocaine-fueled funk album Freaky Styley, produced by Parliament-Funkadelic founder George Clinton, and welcome back guitarist Hillel Slovak.More
July 10, 1985 Playboy publishes nude photos of Madonna taken before she was famous.More
July 3, 1985 Back to the Future, starring Michael J. Fox as a time-traveling teenager, opens in theaters. When he plays "Johnny B. Goode" in 1955 at the "Enchantment Under the Sea" dance, he gives birth to rock and roll. In the real-life present, a new generation gets a lesson in Chuck Berry from the scene.More
May 18, 1985 After repeated attempts to break through in America, Simple Minds go to #1 with "Don't You (Forget About Me)," which is used in the movie The Breakfast Club.More
May 13, 1985 The Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC) holds a meeting in a Washington church where they foment support for their agenda: a ratings system for albums and concerts like those used for movies, and also to keep offensive album covers out of view in record stores. Their efforts lead to warning stickers on albums with offensive lyrics.More
March 9, 1985 REO Speedwagon's "Can't Fight This Feeling" hits #1 in America, where it stays for three weeks.
January 22, 1985 Singer/songwriter Orianthi Panagaris is born in Adelaide, Australia. She was slated to be Michael Jackson's lead guitarist for his This Is It concert series.
October 19, 1984 The Talking Heads concert movie Stop Making Sense opens in theaters. A highly unconventional film that doesn't rely on crowd shots or backstage footage, it's hailed as a triumph of the genre.More
September 19, 1984 At a whistle-stop in Hammonton, New Jersey, campaigning president Ronald Reagan praises singer Bruce Springsteen, saying: "America's future rests in a thousand dreams inside your hearts; it rests in the message of hope in songs so many young Americans admire: New Jersey's own Bruce Springsteen. And helping you make those dreams come true is what this job of mine is all about." This leads to widespread criticism in the press because Springsteen's recent hit, "Born In The U.S.A.," is in fact a bitter cry of outrage at how poorly the United States treats its veterans, which Reagan had apparently mistaken for a straight-forward patriotic anthem - an easy mistake to make if you listen to the chorus only and not the lyrics.
September 16, 1984 The TV series Miami Vice makes its debut with a two-hour episode that includes a scene featuring the Phil Collins hit "In The Air Tonight."More
September 14, 1984 At the very first MTV Video Music Awards, Madonna performs "Like A Virgin" in a white wedding gown accessorized by her famous "Boy Toy" belt.More
©2026 Songfacts®, LLC