Rock 'n' Roll History for
June 5


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1956 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Gene Vincent's "Be-Bop-A-Lula" is released in America where it will reach #5 and sell over a million copies. Although he never quite matched that success, his 1957 releases, "Lotta Lovin'" reached #13 and "Dance to the Bop" climbed to #23. Vincent died in 1971 at the age of 36 of a seizure brought on by a bleeding ulcer.

June 5
Elvis Presley made his second appearance on Milton Berle's Texaco Star Theatre, where his hip swinging gyrations during his performance of "Hound Dog" provoked howls of outrage. TV critics panned him, saying his performance looked 'like the mating dance of an aborigine', while others said he had 'no future in the music business.' Jack Gould of The New York Times declared, 'Mr. Presley has no discernible singing ability', while John Crosby of the New York Herald Tribune called Elvis 'unspeakably untalented and vulgar'.

1958 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
The L.P. "Johnny Mathis' Greatest Hits" went to number 1 in the US. It stayed on the charts for 490 weeks, setting a longevity record that would not be broken until the 1980s by Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon".


1959 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Bob Zimmerman graduated from high school in Hibbing, Minnesota. Zimmerman was known as a greaser to classmates in the remote rural community because of his long sideburns and leather jacket. Soon, Zimmerman would be performing at coffee houses at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and later in Greenwich Village in New York City. He would also change his name to Bob Dylan.

1960 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
"I'm Sorry" by 15-year-old Brenda Lee entered the Billboard Hot 100, on its way to #1 by the following July. It also reached #4 on the R&B chart and #12 in the UK. Lee, who was born Brenda Mae Tarpley, would go on to place another twenty-seven songs on the chart over the next seven years.

1961 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Roy Orbison had his first US number 1 hit with "Running Scared". Earlier, he had placed "Only the Lonely" and "Blue Angel" into the Top 10. Orbison had to be coaxed into the soaring vocal climax at the end of the song because he was being drowned out by the instrumental build-up. Roy and his songwriting partner Joe Melson would later say that they wrote the song in about five minutes.

1964 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
David Jones And The King Bees released their first record, "Liza Jane" in the UK on the Vocalion Pop label. Despite the single being heavily promoted on the television shows Juke Box Jury, Ready Steady Go! and The Beat Room, and receiving a good amount of radio play, sales were weak and the band was subsequently dropped from the label. Jones later became David Bowie to avoid confusion with Davy Jones of The Monkees.

1965 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
After co-writing Diane Renay's "Navy Blue" the previous year, Eddie Rambeau was about to enjoy a hit of his own when "Concrete And Clay" enters the Billboard Top 40 on its way to #35. He would go on to appear on Shindig!, American Bandstand, and Where The Action Is, but his follow-up singles, "My Name is Mud" and "The Train" did not enjoy as much success.


1971 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Carly Simon opens for Cat Stevens at Carnegie Hall in New York City, where she debuts "Anticipation", a song she wrote in fifteen minutes a few days earlier while waiting for Stevens to pick her up for a date. When it was released as a single the following November, the song would rise to #13 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #10 on the Cashbox Best Sellers chart. It would also gain Simon a Grammy Award nomination for Best Pop Female Vocalist.

June 5
James Taylor's "You've Got A Friend" is released. Of the 14 US Top 40 hits he will achieve, this will be his only chart topper.

June 5
A song called "Want Ads" hit the top of the Cashbox chart in the US. The tune had first been recorded for the Hot Wax label by the group Glass House, then by Freda Payne, but producers weren't satisfied with either version and had a three piece girl group called Honey Cone give it a try. The result was a smash and was followed by three more Top 30 hits for the Los Angeles based trio.

June 5
Grand Funk broke The Beatles' box office record by selling out Shea Stadium in 72 hours. The concert grossed more than $300,000. That was about $2,000 more than The Beatles made at their 1965 Shea concert.

1972 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Maureen McGovern quit her job as a secretary for a new career as a singer. She was part of a trio before recording as a solo artist in July 1973. Her first song, "The Morning After", from the movie, The Poseidon Adventure, would be a million-seller.

1974 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Sly Stone and Kathy Silva are married by Sly's uncle, Bishop Stewart, in front of 19,000 fans during a concert at Madison Square Garden in New York. The union would end five months later with Kathy taking custody of the couple's son.

June 5
The Bobbie Gentry Happiness Hour summer TV show debuted on CBS. The four episode series received good ratings, but would not be renewed for the Fall line-up.

1975 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
The Rolling Stones became the first artists to receive record royalties from the Soviet Union. Until the country's copyright laws were changed, the Soviets had made no payment to any artist for work released or used in that country.

1977 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Alice Cooper lost one of his most famous stage props when a rat being served as dinner to Cooper's boa constrictor, bit the snake and killed it. In a novel publicity stunt, Cooper held public auditions to replace the snake.

1979 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
64 year old Muddy Waters, whose real name is McKinley Morganfield, married his third wife, 25 year old Marva Jean Brooks. Eric Clapton served as a witness.


1987 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
42-year-old Sly Stone surrenders to authorities in Fort Meyers, Florida, for violating his probation. He had been arrested on cocaine possession and drug paraphernalia charges after he passed out at a Ramada Inn in Fort Myers in 1983. He was placed on probation for three years in January, 1984. A spokeswoman said Stone was given no special treatment. "He's just in there with everybody else," she said.

June 5
Among the acts featured at the fifth annual Prince's Trust Rock Gala at Wembley Arena in London are George Harrison and Eric Clapton performing "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and Jeff Lynne backing Ringo Starr on "A Little Help From My Friends". Elton John and Ben E. King also appear.

1988 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
After nine years of marriage, Eric Clapton's wife, the former Patti Boyd Harrison, filed for divorce following his affair with Italian model Lory Del Santo, who had given birth to his son, Conor, in August 1986.

1989 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
The Doobie Brothers reformed their original hit making line-up and hit the concert trail to promote the newly released, "Cycles" album. The first single from the album, "The Doctor", made it into the US Top 10, while the follow-up, "Need a Little Taste of Love" reached number 45. Other members of the group performed live vocals on songs previously sung by Michael McDonald, who wasn't invited to re-join the group.


1990 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
42-year-old Jim Hodder, original drummer for Steely Dan, drowns in the swimming pool at his home in Point Arena, California.

1993 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Conway Twitty, who had a number one Pop hit in 1958 with "It's Only Make Believe", died of a heart attack during surgery after a blood vessel had ruptured in his stomach. He was 59.

1998 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Van Halen canceled their concert at Hamburg Docks in Germany after drummer Alex Van Halen was injured when some chunks of plaster from the ceiling fell on him. The accident occurred during a sound check and caused only minor bruising to his arm.

2002 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Drug charges against Dionne Warwick were dropped after a Miami-Dade County judge agreed to a plea bargain deal which included a drug treatment program. The singer, who was not in court, was arrested May 12th at Miami International Airport after baggage screeners said they found eleven suspected marijuana cigarettes inside her lipstick container.

June 5
Ramones bassist Dee Dee Ramone (real name: Douglas Glenn Colvin) was found dead in his Hollywood, California home. He was 50 years old. Ramone was found unconscious by his wife Barbara at approximately 8:25 p.m. and was pronounced dead at the scene by fire department paramedics approximately 15 minutes later.

2004 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Former Amboy Dukes' guitarist Ted Nugent, along with Country rocker Toby Keith, entertained more than 500 soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen in Iraq, as a part of a USO tour.

2007 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Jurors in the murder trial of music producer Phil Spector were shown the bloody revolver that was found at the feet of Lana Clarkson, the actress he was accused of killing at his home in the early hours of February 3rd, 2003. She had accompanied Spector to his Alhambra, California mansion after meeting him at her job as a hostess at the House of Blues just hours earlier.

2008 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Ozzy Osbourne accepted undisclosed libel damages and an apology over a UK newspaper claim that he was ill at the Brit Awards. The 59-year-old rocker sued over a story in the Daily Star that alleged he had toppled over twice just before the televised ceremony and that he was moved around the awards in an electric buggy.

2011 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Michael Jackson's iconic red and black jacket that he wore in his 1983 Thriller video was to be the featured piece put up for sale by Julien's Auctions Music Icons in Beverly Hills. It was expected to bring in $200,000.

2012 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
The Beach Boys album "That's Why God Made the Radio" is released to coincide with the band's 50th anniversary. It's the first new, all-original Beach Boys LP since the 1998 death of co-founder Carl Wilson and features core members Brian Wilson, Mike Love and Al Jardine. It would go on to reach #3 on the Billboard 200 chart and became their highest charting studio album of new material since 1965.


2013 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Michael Jackson's 15-year-old daughter, Paris, was listed in good condition after allegedly cutting her wrists in an apparent suicide attempt.

June 5
Marshall Sewell of the Doo-Wop group, The Edsels, died of esophageal cancer at the age of 75. The Campbell, Ohio quintet reached #21 on the Hot 100 in 1961 with "Rama Lama Ding Dong". The name of the group was originally The Essos, after the oil company, but was changed in 1958 to match the new Ford automobile, the Edsel.

2014 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
British police charged former Glam Rock star Gary Glitter with eight counts of sexual offences against girls who were aged from 12 to 14 between 1977 and 1980.

June 5
John Lennon's original poetry and drawings for his mid-Sixties books In His Own Write and A Spaniard in the Works were part of over 100 Lennon manuscripts that sold for $2.9 million at Sotheby's in New York.

2016 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
The four members of ABBA performed alongside one another for the first time since 1982 at a private gala to mark 50 years since songwriting duo Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson met for the first time in Stockholm. The impromptu performance reportedly began when Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstadon recited their 1980 hit "Me and I" as a tribute to Andersson and Ulvaeus, before the two others joined in and made the reunion official.

June 5
Bobby Curtola, a Canadian teen idol who reached #41 on the Billboard Hot 100 with "Fortuneteller" in 1962, passed away at the age of 73. Over his career Curtola achieved 25 Canadian Gold singles and 12 Canadian Gold albums.


2020 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Forbes.com named Elton John as the biggest earner in Rock music over the last twelve months with an income of $81 million. He was followed by The Rolling Stones ($59 million), Phil Collins ($45 million), Eagles ($41 million), Metallica ($40.5 million), Bon Jovi ($38 million), U2 ($38 million), Paul McCartney ($37 million) and KISS ($37.5 million).

2023 - ClassicBands.com

June 5
Brazilian singer Astrud Gilberto passed away at the age of 83. She is most often remembered as the voice of the 1964 Stan Getz hit, "The Girl From Ipanema", which reached #5 on the Hot 100 and #29 in the UK. Although the song sold over five million copies world wide, Gilberto received the standard session fee of just $125.



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