1963: Johnny Cash began recording sessions for his nineteenth studio album, I Walk the Line. Released in May the following year by Columbia Records, it later became Cash’s second #1 on the Billboard Country chart.

1964: The Rolling Stones released the second single from their self-titled debut album, “Tell Me.” Released as single A-side exclusively in the US & Canada, it became the first Mick Jagger and Keith Richards song to enter the US top 40, and peaked at #24.

1965: The Yardbirds’ first American album, For Your Love, was released by Epic Records. A mix of US-only tracks and previously recorded singles, the LP reached #96 on Billboard chart.

1966: The Byrds released “5D (Fifth Dimension),” the second single and title track from their third studio album, Fifth Dimension. Writer Roger McGuinn has described the song’s lyrics as an attempt to explain Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity, and as having been directly inspired by the book 1-2-3-4, More, More, More, More by Don Landis.

1966: Aretha Franklin’s ninth studio album, Soul Sister, was released. It was her last album to chart before her breakthrough success after moving to Atlantic Records after the expiration of her contract with Columbia Records.

1967: “You’re My Everything” by The Temptations was released as the third single from the group’s fifth studio album, The Temptations with a Lot o’ Soul.

1967: “Your Unchanging Love” by Marvin Gaye was released as the sixth and final single from his seventh studio album, Moods of Marvin Gaye.

1969: Pink Floyd released their third studio album and first soundtrack, More, in the UK. Produced for the directorial debut of Barbet Schroeder, it was the band’s first album without founder Syd Barrett. The album was later released in the US in August.

1969: Soul Bowl ‘69, billed as one of the biggest soul festivals ever and organized by the Reverend E.L. Franklin, father of Aretha and a gospel-music legend in his own right, was scheduled to open at the Houston Astrodome, featuring acts that included Aretha Franklin, Sam and Dave, the Staples Singers, Houston native Johnny “Guitar” Watson, Percy Sledge, and Ray Charles. City officials were evidently worried that Charles’ planned appearances elsewhere in Texas would potentially hurt his draw at the Astrodome, so the show was moved to a much small venue in Dallas, and ultimately canceled altogether.

1969: The Who staged the Hollywood premiere of Tommy, performing the rock opera at the Hollywood Palladium as part of the “Magic Circus” with fellow acts Poco and the Bonzo Dog Band. Attendees at the show included Janis Joplin, members of Spirit, Mama Cass Elliot, David Crosby, Peter Tork, and The Turtles.

1970: The Beatles’ last US single, “The Long and Winding Road,” became their twentieth and final #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 two months after the group had broken up. On the same day, the group’s final album, Let It Be, started four-weeks at #1 the Billboard pop chart.

1970: Blood, Sweat and Tears left the US to embark on the first tour by a Western rock group to Eastern Europe behind the Iron Curtain. The 26-day, 11-concert tour consisted of stops in Yugoslavia, Romania, and Poland. The band traveled with their own equipment, especially designed to handle DC current, and all accommodations were paid for by the governments of the respective countries.

1975: Jefferson Starship’s second studio album, Red Octopus, was released. It marked the return of original Jefferson Airplane singer Marty Balin, and went on to become the band’s biggest success on the chart, reaching #1 in the US, as well as becoming the band’s biggest-selling LP.

1979: Joni Mitchell released Mingus, her tenth studio album and collaboration with jazz composer and musician Charles Mingus.

1979: The Cars released their second studio album, Candy-O. It outperformed their debut LP, peaking at #3 on the Billboard pop chart.

1980: Moody Blues frontman Justin Hayward released Night Flight, an album that came about as a result of Hayward’s involvement in Jeff Wayne’s musical adaptation of War of the Worlds.

1982: “Ribbon in the Sky” by Stevie Wonder was released. The single was one of four new songs included on his recently released greatest hits compilation Original Musiquarium I.

1983: Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble released their debut studio album, Texas Flood. The LP had been recorded over a three day period at Jackson Browne’s personal recording studio in Los Angeles.

1986: Manfred Mann’s Earth Band released Criminal Tango, the group’s first album with Virgin Records after eleven years with Bronze Records. It also marked the return of founding member Mick Rogers.

1988: George Harrison released “This Is Love,” the fifth single from his eleventh studio album, Cloud Nine.

1988: Pink Floyd released “One Slip,” the third single from the band’s thirteenth studio album, A Momentary Lapse of Reason.

1989: Mary Chapin Carpenter released her second album, State of the Heart.

1995: Del Amitri released “Roll to Me,” the third single from their fourth studio album, Twisted.

1995: Canadian singer and songwriter Alanis Morissette’s third studio album and international debut, Jagged Little Pill, was released. That fall, the LP hit the top of the US charts, making Morissette the first Canadian to achieve a #1 album in America. It was the highest-selling debut album by a female artist in the US, the best-selling debut album worldwide, and Morissette also became the first Canadian to achieve double diamond sales, with over thirty-three million copies sold worldwide. At the 38th Grammy Awards in 1996, Jagged Little Pill won five awards and 21-year-old Morissette became the youngest artist to win Album of the Year, a record she held until 2010.

1996: Jesse Colin Young released Sweetwater, his first live album in twenty years, which chronicles performances recorded between 1993 and 1996.

2000: Eric Clapton and B.B. King released their first collaborative album, Riding with the King. The LP reached the top of Billboard’s blues chart and won that year’s Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album.

2003: The Arctic Monkeys made their live debut at The Grapes pub in Sheffield, England, and received £27 (or $46) from ticket sales.

2006: David Gilmour released “Smile,” the third single from his third solo studio album, On an Island.

2011: Stevie Wonder was inducted into the Legends Hall of Fame at New York’s Apollo Theater, the same venue where he began his professional career at the age of 12 in 1962. Wonder performed during the theater’s annual spring gala that night alongside Paul Shaffer, Chick Corea, Doug E. Fresh, and Tony Bennett, who presented Wonder with the honor.

Birthdays Today

Uriel Jones, session drummer for Motown’s in-house studio band the Funk Brothers during the 1960s and early 1970s, who played on hits by artists such as Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder, was born in Detroit, MI in 1934.

Bobby Freeman, soul and R&B singer, songwriter, and record producer known for his top 10 hits “Do You Want to Dance” and “C’mon and Swim,” was born in Alameda County, CA in 1940.

Marv Tarplin, guitarist, songwriter, and member of the Miracles from the 1950s through the early 1970s, who co-wrote several of the group’s biggest hits, was born in Atlanta, GA in 1941.

James Carr, R&B and soul singer, was born in Coahoma, MS in 1942.

Arlester “Dyke” Christian, leader of funk band Dyke and the Blazers, was born in Buffalo, NY in 1943.

Paul Buckmaster, musician, arranger, conductor, and composer best known for his orchestral collaborations with David Bowie, Shawn Phillips, Elton John, Harry Nilsson, The Rolling Stones, Carly Simon, Leonard Cohen, Miles Davis, the Grateful Dead, and many others, was born in London, England in 1946.

John Kahn, session bassist for several performers including Mike Bloomfield, Nick Gravenites, Mississippi Fred McDowell, John Lee Hooker, Brewer & Shipley, Tom Fogerty, Maria Muldaur, Al Kooper, Jackie DeShannon, and Otis Rush and Jerry Garcia’s principal musical collaborator outside of the Grateful Dead, was born in Memphis, TN in 1947.

Dennis Locorriere, songwriter, guitarist, session musician, solo artist, and former lead singer of Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show, was born in Union City, NJ in 1949.

Howard Leese, guitarist, record producer, musical director, solo artist, and member of Heart, The Paul Rodgers Band, and Bad Company, was born in Hollywood, CA in 1951.

Jorge Santana, guitarist, solo artist, member of Malo, and brother of Carlos Santana, was born in Autlán de Navarro, Jalisco, Mexico in 1951.

Rolf Brendel, drummer and founding member of Nena, was born in Hagen, Germany in 1957.

Rivers Cuomo, lead vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter for Weezer, was born in Manhattan, NY in 1970.