1910 - Are you old enough to remember the American TV shows, Little House On The Prairie and Bonanza? Remember their theme songs, played underneath the opening credits? Well, the bloke who wrote them, David Rose, was born 101 years ago today. Rose won four Emmys and 22 Grammys in his career, which spanned 65 years. Cast your mind back dear reader, and listen to the theme song from both 1960s classic TV series.
1958 - It's 1958, and vocal group, The Platters sang Twilight Time on Ed Sullivan, but sadly the recording was not kept, so here's a bootleg I found - same year, '58, but recorded live in Paris, where the group was huge. I love this song. It was the first ever record I bought. I was 11 years old, and this song was my mother's favourite, so I saved up for four weeks, took the shilling and bought the 78 rpm recording from Coles in Hay Street, Perth. Check it out.
1963 - Jan and Dean were kind of like a boy band, but there were just two of them, and this is the song the duo recorded June 15, in 1963, as the surf music craze spread from California to the rest of the known beach world.
1967 - John Mayall was, and remains, the go-to man when it comes to British blues music, attracting most guitar players to his band at some stage during their careers. One such notable was the great Peter Green who did a stint, honed his craft, and then left Mayall today, to form one of England's greatest ever blues bands, the original Fleetwood Mac.This first video is just about the best collection of bad women one could ever view. Watch these bad women while listening to Mayall and Greene together, then Peter Greene's Fleetwood Mac - the original Mac.
1968 - They fell for his hype, hook, line and sinker, but they soon rectified the situation. Indeed it was this day the Beatles chose to announce their involvement with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi as a public mistake, at a press conference in New York. But before they denounced him, dear reader, this is the Beatles seduced by the old Yogi's charm. Then a beautiful version of their denouncement song, Sexy Sadie. Lennon originally wanted to title the song Maharishi but the Beatles changed the title to Sexy Sadie at George Harrison's request. Lennon was disillusioned after Maharishi Mahesh Yogi had allegedly made a sexual advance at one of the female members attending the course. Lennon once said of the song: "That was inspired by Maharishi. I wrote it when we had our bags packed and were leaving. It was the last piece I wrote before I left India. I just called him, Sexy Sadie, instead of, "Maharishi what have you done, you made a fool of everyone." I was just using the situation to write a song, rather calculatingly but also to express what I felt. I was leaving the Maharishi with a bad taste. You know, it seems that my partings are always not as nice as I'd like them to be." The version here is a demo from the Beatles. Beautiful.
1989 - This was the day that Nirvana's first album Bleach was released on the Sub Pop record label, way before their global fame. "There was this pressure from Sub Pop and the grunge scene to play rock music," Cobain said years later, and noted that he stripped it "down and made it sound like Aerosmith." Cobain also felt he had to fit the expectations of the grunge sound to build a fanbase, and hence suppressed his arty and pop songwriting traits while crafting the record. Total gem vintage footage from Nirvana's debut album, this song being Negative Creep - Nirvana fast, gritty, angry, during a rehearsal.
1998 - The second Spice Girls piece in a week, goodness me. The Spice Girls began their first North American tour in Miami 13 years ago today. Here's an interview from around that time, just to let you know how silly it all was, but how much fun for those involved
