Today's birthdays:
Angus Young, 69.
Angus McKinnon Young is an Australian musician, best known as the co-founder, lead guitarist, songwriter, and the only remaining founding member of the hard rock band AC/DC. He is known for his energetic performances, schoolboy-uniform stage outfits and his own version of Chuck Berry's duckwalk. Young was ranked 38th in the 2023 edition of Rolling Stone's 250 greatest guitarists of all-time list. In 2003, Young and the other members of AC/DC were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
On this day today:
1685 - Johann Sebastian Bach is born in Germany.
1934 - Richard Chamberlain is born in Beverly Hills, California. He finds fame as the star of TV's Dr. Kildare and also has string of '60s hits in the UK.
1944 - Guitarist Mick Ralphs of Mott the Hoople and Bad Company is born in Herefordshire, England.
1949 - RCA introduces the 45 rpm record, which eventually becomes the format of choice for "singles," becoming more popular than the 78 rpm format by 1958.
1958 - Chuck Berry releases "Johnny B. Goode." The song is named after his piano player (Johnnie Johnson) and the street where he grew up (Goode Avenue).
1959 - Robert Holmes (guitarist for 'Til Tuesday) is born in England.
1962 - In these pre-Beatles years, Connie Francis is one of the biggest stars in America. She scores her third #1 with "Don't Break The Heart That Loves You."
1967 - At the Astoria Theatre in London, Jimi Hendrix sets fire to his guitar for the first time, and goes to the hospital after the show with minor burns. During the rest of the tour, Hendrix makes a habit of playing his guitar with his teeth, and he ignites his axe a few more times.
1969 - John Lennon and Yoko Ono hold a press conference in Vienna where they announce their "Bagism" project, giving the entire press conference from inside a white bag.
1969 - Led Zeppelin's first album is released in the UK. The self-titled LP contains many hard rock classics, including "Dazed And Confused," "Good Times, Bad Times" and "Communication Breakdown."
1972 - America's self-titled debut album hits #1 in, yes, America.
1973 - Elton John appears on the front page of Melody Maker, which proclaims, "Now Elton's A Teen Idol!"
1981 - At the first ever Golden Raspberry Awards (aka The Razzies), Neil Diamond takes home the prize for Worst Actor for his performance as Yussel Rabinovitch in The Jazz Singer. Laurence Olivier, who played Cantor Rabinovitch in the film, also scores a Razzie for Worst Supporting Actor, an honor he shares with John Adames for Gloria.
1982 - The Doobie Brothers announce their breakup. After a summer goodbye tour, lead singer Michael McDonald launches a successful solo career. The band regroups in 1987.
1984 - Kenny Loggins' "Footloose" hits #1 in America. It's the title song to the soon-to-be-famous film where Kevin Bacon brings dancing to a small town in the South.
1984 - Jack Antonoff, producer of hits for Taylor Swift, Lorde and Lana Del Rey, is born in Bergenfield, New Jersey.
1992 - Bruce Springsteen releases two albums on the same day, Human Touch and Lucky Town. They're his first since Tunnel Of Love in 1987, and first without the E Street Band.
1992 - After the sudden split of The Judds - a hit country duo she formed with her mom, Naomi - Wynonna Judd kicks off her solo career with a self-titled album that helps country crossover to the mainstream thanks to the hit single "No One Else On Earth."
1995 - 23-year-old Tejano singer Selena dies after being shot by her former personal assistant and former fan club president, Yolanda Saldivar, in Corpus Christi, Texas. Jennifer Lopez stars in a movie about her life that is released in 1997.
1999 - The Matrix opens in theaters with a soundtrack featuring Marilyn Manson, Ministry, The Prodigy and Rob Zombie. It establishes industrial music as the sound of simulation theory.
2000 - The movie High Fidelity, starring John Cusack and Jack Black as record store clerks, and featuring a cameo by Bruce Springsteen, opens in theaters.
2003 - The Roots release Phrenology three years after their highly successful fourth album, Things Fall Apart. An ambitious work that pushes the boundaries of hip-hop, Phrenology also contains a hit: the Cody ChesnuTT collaboration "The Seed (2.0)."
2016 - Michael Stipe, Cyndi Lauper, Ann Wilson and Perry Farrell are among the performers at a Carnegie Hall concert honoring David Bowie.
2017 - The coming-of-age drama 13 Reasons Why drops on Netflix with a song called "The Night We Met" captivating viewers in the fifth episode. The song, released two years earlier by a little-known band called Lord Huron, goes viral and reappears in season 2 as a remix with Phoebe Bridgers.
