Rock 'n' Roll History for
July 23


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1955 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Slim Whitman's "Rose Marie" climbed to the top of the UK singles chart where it would stay for 11 weeks. That feat set a record that would last 36 years until Bryan Adams spent 16 weeks at the top with "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You".


1966 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Country star Roger Miller reaches Billboard's Hot 100 with a novelty tune called "You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd". The song, which Miller later said was the favorite of all the songs he wrote, will climb to #40.

July 23
"Sunny" by Bobby Hebb enters the Billboard charts, where it will reach #2 during an 11 week run. The song was written about Bobby's brother, who had been killed by a mugger in 1963, and started out as an album filler until it was picked for a single release. The record rose to #12 in the UK.

July 23
The Troggs led the Cashbox Best Sellers chart with their version of "Wild Thing". Lead singer Reg Presley would later say that after hearing the song for the first time, he was hesitant to record it because the words were "so corny."

July 23
Frank Sinatra had the top selling album in the US with "Strangers In The Night". The LP would be the most successful of his career, being certified Platinum for 1 million copies sold in the US. The title track would earn him two Grammy awards for Record Of The Year and Best Male Vocal Performance.

1968 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
The up-and-coming UK band The Iveys sign to The Beatles' label Apple Records, which re-christens them Badfinger. They became the first non-Beatle recording artists on the label. They would go on to enjoy three Top 40 hits in Great Britain and four in America.

1969 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
James Brown walks out of L.A. Mayor Sam Yorty's office when the mayor fails to show up at 10 a.m. as promised. Yorty was going to present Brown with a proclamation declaring James Brown Day.

1977 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Led Zeppelin's drummer John Bonham was charged with assault after a concert at the Oakland Coliseum in California. Bonham and band manager Peter Grant had the help of their bodyguard in roughing up a security employee at the venue. After pleading guilty to misdemeanors, the accused settle out of court for two million dollars.

July 23
Peter Frampton had the best selling single in America with "I'm In You". Both the song and the album of the same name would go on to reach Platinum status.

July 23
Although it failed to catch on in the UK, "Looks Like We Made It" becomes Barry Manilow's third US number one single. The song had been written by Richard Kerr, the same man who wrote the music for Manilow's first number one, "Mandy".

July 23
Donna Summer's Disco hit "I Feel Love" tops the UK chart in the first of a four week stay.

July 23
Foreigner releases "Cold As Ice", from their self-titled debut album. The single would reach #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 and climb to #24 on the UK singles chart in 1978.


1979 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
The Ayatollah Khomenini bans all forms of Rock 'n' Roll in Iran, claiming it has a corrupting influence.

1980 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Former Grateful Dead keyboardist Keith Godchaux dies of head injuries sustained in a car accident two days earlier. He was 32 years of age. In 1994, he was inducted, posthumously, into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Dead.

1983 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
"Synchronicity", the fifth and final studio album by The Police, went to #1 on the Billboard chart for the first of seventeen weeks. The LP contained the hit single, "Every Breath You Take", which would win Song Of The Year honors at next year's Grammy Awards.


1989 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Ringo Starr launched his first tour since the break-up of The Beatles with a show in Dallas. Starr began the concert with his 1971 hit "It Don't Come Easy". His backup band included guitarist Joe Walsh, organist Billy Preston and Bruce Springsteen's sax man Clarence Clemons.

1994 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
The International Astronomical Union named an asteroid orbiting between Mars and Jupiter after Frank Zappa, who had died the previous December.

2001 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
59 year old Paul McCartney, who lost his first wife Linda to cancer three years ago, becomes engaged to 33 year old Heather Mills, an activist for the disabled. It will be the first marriage for Mills, a former swim wear model whose left leg was amputated below the knee after she was run down by a police motorcyclist in 1993. The pair would split in 2006 and divorce in 2008, with a settlement that cost Macca millions.

2003 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
The Sun Records studio in Memphis was designated a national historic landmark.

July 23
James Brown announced that he was separating from his fourth wife by placing a notice in Variety magazine that showed a picture of himself, his wife Tomi Rae and their two-year-old son, James Brown II, posing with Goofy at Walt Disney World.

2010 - ClassicBands.com

July 23
Surgical instruments allegedly used to conduct Elvis Presley's autopsy were removed from an upcoming auction amid doubts about their authenticity. Forceps, needle injectors, rubber gloves and a toe tag were among the items that were expected to fetch about $14,000 at Chicago, Illinois' Leslie Hindman Auctioneers. The so-called "memorabilia" was supposedly kept by a senior embalmer at the Memphis Funeral Home where the singer's body was stored prior to his funeral, but the claims were questioned after another employee revealed that the equipment was sterilized and used again in other autopsies.



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