Rock 'n' Roll History for
August 23


<-- Previous Day -- Home Page -- Next Day -->



1962 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
John Lennon marries his pregnant girlfriend, Cynthia Powell at the Mount Pleasant Registry Office in Liverpool. Paul and George are the only others in attendance. Efforts to keep the marriage quiet were dashed when they were spotted coming out of the registry office. John spent his wedding night playing a gig with The Beatles at the nearby Riverpark Ballroom.

1963 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Beatles' single "She Loves You" with "I'll Get You" on the flip side is released in the UK. It will enter the British charts on August 31st and remain there for thirty-one consecutive weeks, eighteen of those in the top three. That sets a record for the best-selling UK single of all time, a mark that isn't eclipsed until 1977, when Paul McCartney releases "Mull Of Kintyre".

1966 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Beatles play Shea Stadium for the second time, with The Remains, Bobby Hebb, The Cyrkle and The Ronettes as warm-up acts. The Fab Four performed eleven songs and made $189,000 for their efforts. Brian Epstein was unsettled by the fact that the concert did not sell out, with 11,000 of the 55,600 tickets still available.


1967 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Beatles begin recording "Your Mother Should Know" at Chappell Recording Studios in central London. Because of scheduling conflicts, EMI Studios were unavailable. The song would be included on their upcoming album, "Magical Mystery Tour".

1968 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Soft Machine and Big Brother And The Holding Company play at the New York Rock Festival in Flushing Meadows, Queens.

1969 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Rolling Stones enjoy their fifth American chart topper with "Honky Tonk Women". The record also made #1 in the UK. It was the last hit that included original guitarist Brian Jones, who had drowned in his swimming pool on July 3rd.

August 23
Johnny Cash started a four-week run at #1 on the Billboard 200 chart with his second live album, "Johnny Cash At San Quentin". The LP was nominated for several Grammy Awards, including Album Of The Year and won Best Male Country Vocal Performance for "A Boy Named Sue". The album would eventually be certified 3x Platinum in America and Gold in Great Britain.

1975 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
This week's number one song on Billboard's Pop singles chart, "Fallin' In Love", was credited to Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds, although drummer Tommy Reynolds had actually left the group three years earlier. He was replaced by Alan Dennison, who would eventually have his name included in the band's moniker. In the UK, the record reached #33.

1976 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The Beach Boys become the first Rock band ever to appear on the cover of People magazine. The caption that accompanied a picture of the five original members, all sporting beards, read: "Still Riding The Crest, 15 Hairy Years Later."

1978 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
Comedian Steve Martin was awarded a Gold record for the novelty song "King Tut", which had reached #17 on the Billboard chart and sold over a million copies.


1980 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The SOS Band had the best selling tune in America with "Take Your Time (Do It Right)". The Atlanta, Georgia based group, whose acronym stood for Sounds Of Success, was fronted by Mary Davis.

August 23
David Bowie's "Ashes To Ashes" tops the UK music chart for the first of two weeks, giving him his first #1 single since "Space Oddity" in 1975.

1987 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
There was big trouble at a Grateful Dead concert, celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Summer of Love, when police killed an escaped drug addict who had shot one of the officers. The band's "In the Dark" album was sitting at number 6 in the US and its single, "Touch of Grey", was still climbing toward the Top Ten.

1997 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
Oasis' "Be Here Now" sells 696,000 copies in its first two days of release in the UK, setting a record for the fastest selling album ever. It will top the chart the following week and reach #2 in the US in September.


2000 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
Kenny Loggins is awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7021 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.

2004 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
Queen, one of Britain's most consistently successful groups of the seventies and eighties, became the first Rock band to receive official approval in Iran, where Western music is strictly prohibited. Lead singer Freddie Mercury, who died of AIDS in 1991, was of Iranian ancestry and bootlegged albums have been available for years.

2005 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
The woman whose son accused Michael Jackson of child molestation was charged with welfare fraud for allegedly collecting nearly $19,000 in payments while making false claims.

August 23
Bay City Rollers' lead singer Les McKeown is arraigned on cocaine possession and distribution charges in London, England. He is acquitted of the intent to distribute in February, 2006.

2012 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
John Lennon's killer, Mark David Chapman, was denied parole for a seventh time. In a written statement, the parole board wrote: "Despite your positive efforts while incarcerated, your release at this time would greatly undermine respect for the law and tend to trivialize the tragic loss of life which you caused as a result of this heinous, unprovoked, violent, cold and calculated crime." The 57-year-old Chapman was being held in protective custody at Wende Correctional Facility, a maximum-security prison in Alden, New York.

2013 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
67-year-old Linda Ronstadt revealed that she was suffering from Parkinson's disease, which has left her unable to sing. She was forced to use poles to help her walk on uneven ground and traveled with a wheelchair.


2018 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
63-year-old Mark David Chapman, the man who gunned down John Lennon on December 8th, 1980, was denied parole by the New York Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. It was the tenth time he had been turned down. Now known as inmate 81A3860, Chapman was being held at the Wende Correctional Facility in Alden, New York, just east of Buffalo, where he's been since 2012 when he was transferred from Attica, about 15 miles away.

2019 - ClassicBands.com

August 23
NASA's Mars InSight Mission named a rock on Mars after The Rolling Stones. The golf ball size rock rolled about three feet after being pushed by the InSight spacecraft's thrusters during touchdown on the red planet in November, 2018.



<-- Previous Day -- Home Page -- Next Day -->