December 2, 1969 - CINDY Birdsong of the Supremes was kidnapped at knife point today, by a maintenance man who worked in the building in which she lived. She later escaped unharmed by jumping out of his car on the San Diego freeway. The kidnapper was arrested in Las Vegas four days later. On the same day in 1972, Carly Simon released her classic song, You're So Vain. The song is a critical profile of a self-absorbed lover, where her lyric asserts, "You're so vain, you probably think this song is about you." The subject's identity has been the matter of speculation, fuelled by Simon slowly revealing clues as to his identity. The song is ranked at seventy-two on Billboard's Greatest Songs of All-Time, and remains Simon's biggest hit, considered her signature song.
1963 - BEATLES recorded an appearance on the UK TV comedy program The Morecombe and Wise Show, tonight. The Beatles played This Boy, All My Loving, and I Want to Hold Your Hand. More importantly, though, the foursome also participated in comedy sketches with the comedy duo. The programme wasn't aired until early the following year. But we air it now.
1967 - MONKEES' fourth - and arguably their best - album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones Ltd, went to #1 on the US album chart. It was their fourth album to sell over a million copies, following The Monkees, More Of The Monkees and Headquarters.
1976 - ELVIS Presley played the first of an 11 night run at the Hilton Hotel, Las Vegas, tonight, and two years later Rod Stewart topped charts around the world with Da Ya Think I'm Sexy. A plagiarism lawsuit by Brazilian musician Jorge Ben Jor confirmed that the song had been ripped from his composition, Taj Mahal. Stewart agreed to donate all his royalties from the song to United Nations Children's Fund. And on the same day in 1979, Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand's version of Diamond's song You Don't Bring Me Flowers was at #1 around the world. A radio station engineer had spliced together Neil's version with Barbra's version and got such good response, the station added it to their play list. When Neil Diamond heard about it, he decided to re-record the song with Streisand herself, & within weeks of release the single topped many world charts.
1982 - FOLK singer David Blue died of a heart attack, today, aged 41, while jogging in New York's Washington Square Park. A member of Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue during the late 70s, Blue wrote Outlaw Man, covered by The Eagles on their 1973 Desperado album.
1983 - MTV aired the full 14-minute version of Michael Jackson's Thriller video for the first time today, and is you go to our archive search engine, you can see it in its entirety. In 1986 on this day, rocker Jerry Lee Lewis checked into the Betty Ford Clinic to overcome his addiction to painkillers, and a year later - during a UK tour - INXS played at Newcastle City Hall, supported by Sinead O'Connor. Four years earlier, fellow Oz rockers Men at Work were at the beginnings of their international success, performing songs from their Cargo album, Rockpalast. This is MAW performing live on German TV series Rockpalast in 1982.
1995 - MARIAH Carey topped world charts today with her Boyz II Men duet, One Sweet Day, and it's now nine years since Darkness singer Justin Hawkins was held for two hours at JFK Airport, New York, after police mistook him for a wanted man with the same name and looks. The police only agreed to let him go after Justin's fiance and manager, Sue Whitehouse, produced a tour schedule to prove that he was in England on July 4th when the crime was committed.
2006 - DUTCH singer Mariska Veres from Shocking Blue died of cancer at the age of 59, just five years ago today. Are you old enough to remember her singing the band's #1 worldwide hit, Venus? Not the Bananarama version, but the original.
1963 - BEATLES recorded an appearance on the UK TV comedy program The Morecombe and Wise Show, tonight. The Beatles played This Boy, All My Loving, and I Want to Hold Your Hand. More importantly, though, the foursome also participated in comedy sketches with the comedy duo. The programme wasn't aired until early the following year. But we air it now.
1967 - MONKEES' fourth - and arguably their best - album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones Ltd, went to #1 on the US album chart. It was their fourth album to sell over a million copies, following The Monkees, More Of The Monkees and Headquarters.
1976 - ELVIS Presley played the first of an 11 night run at the Hilton Hotel, Las Vegas, tonight, and two years later Rod Stewart topped charts around the world with Da Ya Think I'm Sexy. A plagiarism lawsuit by Brazilian musician Jorge Ben Jor confirmed that the song had been ripped from his composition, Taj Mahal. Stewart agreed to donate all his royalties from the song to United Nations Children's Fund. And on the same day in 1979, Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand's version of Diamond's song You Don't Bring Me Flowers was at #1 around the world. A radio station engineer had spliced together Neil's version with Barbra's version and got such good response, the station added it to their play list. When Neil Diamond heard about it, he decided to re-record the song with Streisand herself, & within weeks of release the single topped many world charts.
1982 - FOLK singer David Blue died of a heart attack, today, aged 41, while jogging in New York's Washington Square Park. A member of Bob Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue during the late 70s, Blue wrote Outlaw Man, covered by The Eagles on their 1973 Desperado album.
1983 - MTV aired the full 14-minute version of Michael Jackson's Thriller video for the first time today, and is you go to our archive search engine, you can see it in its entirety. In 1986 on this day, rocker Jerry Lee Lewis checked into the Betty Ford Clinic to overcome his addiction to painkillers, and a year later - during a UK tour - INXS played at Newcastle City Hall, supported by Sinead O'Connor. Four years earlier, fellow Oz rockers Men at Work were at the beginnings of their international success, performing songs from their Cargo album, Rockpalast. This is MAW performing live on German TV series Rockpalast in 1982.
1995 - MARIAH Carey topped world charts today with her Boyz II Men duet, One Sweet Day, and it's now nine years since Darkness singer Justin Hawkins was held for two hours at JFK Airport, New York, after police mistook him for a wanted man with the same name and looks. The police only agreed to let him go after Justin's fiance and manager, Sue Whitehouse, produced a tour schedule to prove that he was in England on July 4th when the crime was committed.
2006 - DUTCH singer Mariska Veres from Shocking Blue died of cancer at the age of 59, just five years ago today. Are you old enough to remember her singing the band's #1 worldwide hit, Venus? Not the Bananarama version, but the original.
