Rock 'n' Roll History for
December 2


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1957 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Sam Cooke leads the Billboard Top 100 chart with "You Send Me", for the first of a three week stay. The song was later cited as one of the 500 most important Rock And roll Recordings by Cleveland's Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. In April 2010, Rolling Stone ranked it at #115 on their list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

December 2
Mercury Records releases The Diamonds' version of "The Stroll". The song will peak at #4 on the Billboard Top 100 chart and help spark a dance craze where two lines of dancers, men on one side and women on the other, face each other, moving in place to the music.

1960 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Elvis enlists the help of his father Vernon to try to convince Priscilla Beaulieu's dad to let her spend the holidays at Graceland. Their efforts would succeed and a scheduled two week stay over Christmas would be extended to nearly a month.

1962 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
The Beatles appear as an opening act for Frank Ifield in Peterborough, England. While Ifield performed in his usual, calm, crooning style, The Beatles were pounding out loud Rock 'n' Roll, causing many in the crowd to demand that they "turn it down!"

1967 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Finally allowed to play instruments on their recordings, The Monkees scored their third US number one single with "Daydream Believer". Written by songwriter John Stewart shortly before he left the Kingston Trio, the song had been previously been turned down by We Five and Spanky And Our Gang. With sales of over one million copies, Stewart said in 2006 that the proceeds from "Daydream Believer" "...kept me alive for all these years."

December 2
The Monkees album, "Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones Ltd" went to number one in the US and was certified Gold. It was their fourth straight LP to sell over a million copies, following "The Monkees", "More Of The Monkees" and "Headquarters". Not a bad run considering The Beatles' classic "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" held the top spot for 15 weeks that year.


1969 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Cindy Birdsong of The Supremes was kidnapped at knife point by Charles Collier, a maintenance man who worked in the building she lived in. She later escaped unharmed by jumping out of his car on the San Diego freeway. The kidnapper turned himself in four days later.

December 2
The Rolling Stones enter Muscle Shoals Sound Studios in Alabama to begin recording "Brown Sugar". The song was not released until over a year later due to legal hassles with Decca Records, the band's former label. When it was issued in April, 1971, the song would top the Billboard Hot 100, reach #2 on the UK Official Chart, and go into the Top Ten in eleven other countries.

1970 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Eric Burdon launches a bumper sticker campaign aimed at fighting VD. For every donation to the LA Free Clinic, Burdon sends out a bumper sticker that says Curb the Clap.

1972 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
The Temptations' version of "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" gave the Motown group their fourth US number one song. The Temps' Otis Williams would later say that he considers "Papa" to be the last real classic the group recorded. An earlier rendition by The Undisputed Truth had stalled at number 63.

1973 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
After a show at the Montreal Forum, members of The Who, along with some of their friends, spend the night in jail for causing over $6,000 worth of destruction in their hotel.

1974 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
While on tour with George Harrison, Ravi Shankar is hospitalized for a week in Chicago after suffering chest pains. After being given a clean bill of health, he rejoined the tour in Boston.

1980 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Kris Kristofferson and Rita Coolidge divorce after six years of marriage.

December 2
"Kenny Roger's Greatest Hits" is certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America, while his latest single, "Lady" is currently #1 on the Billboard Pop chart.


1986 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
51-year-old Jerry Lee Lewis was hospitalized for detoxification in Nashville, Tennessee. From there he was slated to go to the Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage, California for treatment of his addiction to pain killers.

1988 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
KISS members Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons join Willie Nelson on US TV's Geraldo to discuss the day's topic: Sex on the Road.

1991 - ClassicBands.com.

December 2
The US Supreme Court rules that The Shirelles, Gene Pitney and B.J. Thomas were owed $1.2 million in unpaid royalties.

1997 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
31-year-old Eric Zylema slipped off a handrail at a Rolling Stones' concert at the Pontiac Silverdome in Detroit, Michigan and plunged to his death. An autopsy later showed he had a blood-alcohol level of .21 percent.

1998 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Jimmy Buffett performs in his hometown of Mobile, Alabama for the first time in eight years. The concert was held to aid victims of Hurricane Georges.

1999 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Cliff Richard started a three week run at the top of the UK singles chart with "Millennium Prayer", a version of the Lord's Prayer set to the tune of "Auld Lang Syne". Despite the record being boycotted by most radio stations, it became Sir Cliff's 14th UK #1 single.

December 2
US news outlets reported that Stevie Wonder met with doctors to discuss an operation to regain his sight. The breakthrough by top eye specialists involved inserting a microchip in the retina. Unfortunately, Stevie was later ruled out as a candidate for the procedure.

2006 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Mariska Veres, vocalist for Shocking Blue on their 1969 hit "Venus", died of cancer at the age of 59. After Shocking Blue had disbanded in 1974, Mariska continued to tour and record as a solo act with Jazz ensembles and a couple of reunions with her former band mates.


2008 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Odetta, the Folk singer whose powerful voice moved audiences and influenced fellow musicians for over 50 years, died of heart disease at the age of 77. Although never a mainstream Pop star, she was nominated for a Grammy Award three times.

2009 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Eric Woolfson, co-founder of The Alan Parsons Project, died from kidney cancer at the age of 64. His songwriting, combined with his keyboard and vocal contributions, helped sell over 50 million records, including the band's signature tune "Eye in the Sky", which peaked at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in October, 1982.

December 2
Barry Manilow announced that he was preparing a new show slated to open at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel in March. The 63-year-old crooner was winding down his five year run at Las Vegas Hilton.

2010 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Billboard.com introduced a new chart called The Social 50, which ranks the most active artists on the world's leading social networking sites. The chart would follow artists' popularity using a formula blending weekly additions of friends / fans / followers, along with weekly artist page views and weekly song plays on MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and iLike.

2014 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
Bobby Keys, an American saxophonist who worked as both a touring and session musician, died from liver cancer at the age of 70. During his career he appeared on albums by the Rolling Stones, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Harry Nilsson, Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, George Harrison, John Lennon, Eric Clapton, Joe Cocker and many other prominent musicians.

December 2
The website www.WealthX.com listed Madonna as the wealthiest musician in the world with an estimated worth of a staggering $800 million. Paul McCartney was second with $650 million.

2016 - ClassicBands.com

December 2
A list of twenty-five songs were chosen as inductees to the Grammy Hall Of Fame. Among those selected were David Bowie's "Changes", Elvis Presley's "Jailhouse Rock", The Beach Boys' "I Get Around", The Jackson 5's "ABC", Sonny And Cher's "I Got You Babe", Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit", R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion" and N.W.A.'s "Straight Outta Compton" The Grammy Hall Of Fame is open to all genres of music as long as the recording is at least 25 years old. Once the new set of 25 songs were added, the total number of inductees sat at 1,038.



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