The Current

Great Music Lives Here
Listener-Supported Music
Donate Now

Today in Music History: Prince's 'Batman' goes No. 1

Prince at the NAACP Image Awards in 2005.
Prince at the NAACP Image Awards in 2005.Kevin Winter/Getty Images

July 22, 2019

History Highlight:

Today in 1989, Prince's soundtrack album to Batman started a six-week run at No. 1 on the U.S. album chart. The album was No. 1 on the Billboard albums chart for six consecutive weeks and has sold over eleven million copies worldwide. In the album's liner notes, the lyrics of each song are associated with one of the characters in the film.

Also, Today In:

1965 - Mick Jagger, Brian Jones and Bill Wyman from The Rolling Stones were each fined £5 at East Ham Magistrates Court, London, after being found guilty of "insulting behavior" at a Romford Road service station. Charges stemmed from an incident in which all three had urinated against a wall after the service station attendant had refused them the use of the facilities.

1969 - Aretha Franklin was arrested for causing a disturbance in a Detroit parking lot. After posting $50 bail, she ran down a road sign with her car while leaving the police station.

1977 - Stiff Records released My Aim Is True, the debut album from Elvis Costello, in the U.K.

1989 - Former actress Martika started a two-week run at No. 1 on the U.S. singles chart with "Toy Soldiers."

1996 - Donovan was forced to postpone a comeback tour of the U.S. because of a 30-year-old marijuana conviction in the U.K., for which American authorities delayed granting him a waiver to enter the country.

2006 - Johnny Cash was at No. 1 on the U.S. album chart with American V: A Hundred Highways. Released posthumously on July 4, the vocal parts were recorded before Cash's death, but the instruments were not recorded until 2005.

Birthdays:

George Clinton is 78.

Supertramp's Rick Davis is 75.

Don Henley is 72.

Keith Sweat is 58.

Will Calhoun of Living Colour is 55.

Daniel Jones of Savage Garden is 46.

Rufus Wainwright is 46.

Selena Gomez is 27.

Highlights for Today in Music History are gathered from This Day in Music, Paul Shaffer's Day in Rock, Song Facts and Wikipedia.