ON THIS DAY IN MUSIC

August 17th

1960 - The Beatles

The Beatles began their first Hamburg engagement at the Indra Club, Grosse Freiheit, Hamburg, West Germany, playing the first of 48 nights at the Club. The owner, Bruno Koschmider, asked The Beatles to "Mach Shau", or really put on a show, which led to the band screaming, shouting, and leaping about the stage and sometimes playing lying on the floor. John Lennon once appeared wearing only his underwear and on another occasion, wearing a toilet seat around his neck. The Beatles lodged in a single room behind the screen of a nearby movie house.

1964 - The Beatles

Glasgow council in Scotland announced that all boys and men with Beatle styled haircuts would have to wear bathing caps after a committee was told that hair from 'Beatle-cuts' was clogging the pools filters.

1968 - Doors

The Doors started a four-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with Waiting For The Sun. The group's third album spawned their second US No.1 single, 'Hello, I Love You'

and yes, I still have my copy of the single B-side - Love Street

there's a store where the creatures meet I . . . . . . . 

1969 - Woodstock Festival DAY 3

The final day of the 3 day Woodstock Festival took place at Max Yasgur's farm in Bethel, New York. Acts who appeared included Crosby, Stills Nash & Young, The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Ten Years After, John Sebastian, Sha Na Na, Joe Cocker, Country Joe and the Fish, The Band, Ten Years After, Johnny Winter and Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Over 186,000 tickets had been sold but on the first day the flimsy fences and ticket barriers had come down. Organisers announced the concert would be a free event, prompting thousands more to head for the concert.

By the time Hendrix came on to headline & finish the festival many people had already gone home and he played what was to come to be a swan song of a concerto piece in the American National Anthem, in Jimi's inimitable style. Those who witnessed it never quite forgot it.

1974 - Eric Clapton

Eric Clapton started a four-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with 461 Ocean Boulevard, a No.3 hit in the UK. The house featured on the album cover is 461 Ocean Boulevard in the town of Golden Beach, Florida near Miami where Clapton lived while making the album. Again I am not entirely sure whether I am embarrassed to say we bought this when it came out but it has a number of songs on it (Let it Grow) that we held in high regard as a couple. 

1979 - Anita Pallenberg

The New York Post reported that Anita Pallenberg (the wife of Keith Richards) was linked to a witches coven in South Salem, New York where Richards owned a house. A policeman claimed he was attacked by a flock of black-hooded, caped people and a local youth claimed he had been invited by Pallenburg to take part in ‘pot smoking sex orgies’. Locals also claimed they found ‘ritualistic stakes’ and small animals that had been ‘sacrificed’ near the house. Keith Richards’ partner after Jones' death, she was a wickedly beautiful German model who, herself caught up in the vortex of drugs and debauchery in the band’s orbit, was rumoured to be a practitioner of the dark arts. Marianne Faithfull said “Anita eventually took the goddess business one step further into witchcraft. There were moments, especially after Brian died, where she went a little mad.” It didn’t help that she was cast with Jagger in the film Performance, in which a London gangster (played by James Fox) changes identities with a decadent rock star (Jagger, naturally). Keith Richards considered the director, Donald Cammell, “a twister and a manipulator whose only real love in life was fucking other people up,” but Pallenberg appeared to enjoy her nude scenes with Jagger and another member of their threesome, Michelle Breton who eventually died of a heroin overdose.

Anita Pallenberg

Performance: Jagger, Breton and Pallenberg

Anita

1991 - Nirvana

Nirvana shot the video for 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' at GMT Studios in Culver City, California, costing less than $50,000 to make, the shoot features real Nirvana fans as the audience. The video won Nirvana the Best New Artist and Best Alternative Group awards at the 1992 MTV Video Music Awards, and in 2000 the Guinness World Records named 'Teen Spirit' the Most Played Video on MTV Europe.

1995 - Dave Gahan

Depeche Mode singer Dave Gahan was rushed to Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre after an apparent suicide attempt. Police had found him at his Los Angeles home with a two-inch laceration on his wrist.

Dave Gahan and we hope better now, much loved by his fans

1999 - Led Zeppelin

Led Zeppelin topped a chart of Britain's most bootlegged musicians, compiled by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), after identifying 384 bootleg titles featuring Led Zeppelin performances. The bootleg chart was complied from the BPI's archive of some 10,000 recordings seized over the past 25 years. The Beatles came in second with 320 entries, other acts listed included The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and Pink Floyd. This in retrospect is funny as there is really only one recording that achieved legendary status for true bootleg fans and that is the Southampton gig which in the opinion of some is better than the officially released live album 'The Mothership'

2002 - Darius

Darius was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Colourblind'. The third "Pop Idol" finalist to get a number one. He'd originally lost out on "Popstars", failing to get a place in the group Hear'Say, and then came third in "Pop Idol". Noteworthy for his truly awful histrionic performances most notably an hilariously overblown and camp kitsch version of 'Hit Me Baby (One More Time) Darius has since sunk without trace. . . . er scratch that because somehow this guy only married the 'Species' film model and superstar actress Nastaha Henstridge! Although their divorce some 5 years after its instigation lasted considerably longer than their two year marriage . . . . but still. He continues to appear in off broadway musicals that no-one has heard of . . . . . . . 

2009 - Pink Floyd fans quite as bright as they think

A thief in New Zealand took the unusual step of leaving his contact details at the site of his crime. The man reserved a copy of Pink Floyd's The Wall at a record shop in Christchurch, leaving his name and phone number, before robbing the till. He was a regular customer at the shop and already had several records on back order.

2012 - Pussy Riot

Three members of the Russian feminist punk rock protest group Pussy Riot were sentenced to two years imprisonment after they had staged a performance on the soleas of Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior in a protest directed at the Orthodox Church leader's support for President Putin during his election campaign.

BIRTHDAYS

1964 - Maria Mckee

Maria Mckee, singer, Lone Justice (1987 UK No.45 single 'I Found Out'), solo, (1990 UK No.1 single 'Show Me Heaven'). Sister (well half-sister if you must) to Bryan MacLean of Love, the man who wrote 'Alone Again Or', and she too was possessed of a soaring vocal range and distinctive voice.

1955 - Colin Moulding

Colin Moulding, bass player, singer songwriter, XTC, (1982 UK No.10 single 'Senses Working Overtime').

the reason I started liking XTC and bought everything I could ever after was this song by Colin from the 3D EP bought when it came out. . . . . . 

1958 - Belinda Carlisle

Belinda Carlisle, singer, from all-female American rock band The Go-Go's, who had the 1982 US No.2 single, 'We Got The Beat', and the 1982 UK hit single 'Our Lips Are Sealed'. Their 1981 debut album, Beauty and the Beat, is considered one of the "cornerstone albums of US new wave music". Carlisle had the 1987 solo, US & UK No.1 single 'Heaven Is A Place On Earth'.

gosh and golly what could be going on?

with thanks as ever to On This Day in Music