History Highlight:

On this day in 2014, English psych-rock band Temples released their debut album, Sun Structures. Powered by material like the featured single “Shelter Song,” the band earned the respect of Noel Gallagher and Johnny Marr early on. While the album has unmistakable ties to retro sounds of the Beatles, the Zombies, and T. Rex, there was something new lurking in this collection recorded and produced by frontman James Bagshaw in his house. Temples have now released a total of four studio albums, including 2023’s Exotico.

Also, Today In:

1957 - Bill Haley & His Comets arrived in the U.K. to begin their tour of the U.K. Haley was the first American rock star to tour the U.K.

1967 - The News Of The World reported that Mick Jagger had taken LSD at the Moody Blues' home in the UK. Jagger sued the paper for libel in an ongoing feud between the News Of The World and The Stones.

1967 - "Hello, Goodbye" off Magical Mystery Tour by The Beatles was the No. 1 single in the country. The single was commercially successful around the world, topping charts in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and several other countries.

1971 - Black Sabbath began recording their third album Master of Reality at Island Studios in London. The album would go on to become their first top ten album in the U.S.

1972 - Paul Simon released his first new song without Art Garfunkel, "Mother and Child Reunion", which peaked at No. 4 in the US. Simon got the idea for the song's title from a chicken-and-egg dish called Mother and Child Reunion that he saw on a Chinese restaurant's menu.

1978 - Emerson, Lake & Palmer broke up.

1983 - Def Leppard's third album Pyromania entered the Billboard 200 Album Chart at number 69. The album would peak at number two, spend 116 weeks on the chart and sell ten million records in the U.S. alone.

1994 - ZZ Top entered the Billboard 200 Album Chart at No. 14 with their eleventh studio album Antenna which was their first album for RCA Records. The album went on to sell one million copies in the U.S.

1994 - Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart with Greatest Hits which went on to sell ten million copies in the U.S.

2006 - The Rolling Stones performed the halftime show of Super Bowl XL in Detroit. The NFL imposed a five-second delay and censored lyrics considered too explicit.

2012 - American record producer and session musician Al De Lory died at age 82. In the early Sixties De Lory played keyboards for various Phil Spector productions, and The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds. As producer for Capitol Records he worked on a series of worldwide hits by Glen Campbell including John Hartford's "Gentle on My Mind", Jimmy Webb's "By the Time I Get to Phoenix", "Wichita Lineman" and "Galveston". He was also a member of the Los Angeles session musicians known as The Wrecking Crew. As a bandleader he had his own hit in 1970 with an instrumental version of the "Song from M*A*S*H".

2016 - A new species of black tarantula that lives near Folsom Prison, California, was named after Johnny Cash. Aphonopelma johnnycashi was among 14 new tarantula species from the southern U.S. which were described by biologists in the journal ZooKeys.

Birthdays:

William S. Burroughs, Beat Generation writer and poet, was born on this day in 1914. He has collaborated with R.E.M. (“Star Me Kitten”), Sonic Youth, Laurie Anderson, Nick Cave, Tom Waits, and Throbbing Gristle, and appears in U2’s music video for “Last Night on Earth.”

Hal Blaine, American drummer and session musician with the Wrecking Crew, was born on this day in 1929.

Alex Harvey, Scottish glam rock star of the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, was born today in 1935.

Barrett Strong was born on this day in 1941. He was the first artist to record a hit for Motown, "Money (That's What I Want)" which was famously covered by The Beatles and others, but he was mainly known for his songwriting skills as he contributed to the writing of many hits including "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" by both Marvin Gaye and Gladys Knight & the Pips; "War" by Edwin Starr; "Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home)" by Paul Young; "Smiling Faces Sometimes" by the Undisputed Truth; and the long line of "psychedelic soul" records by the Temptations, including "Cloud Nine", "I Can't Get Next to You", "Psychedelic Shack", "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)", and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone", among others. Strong died on Jan. 28, 2023.

Henson Cargill, country singer of “Skip a Rope,” was born on this day in 1941.

Corey Wells of Three Dog Knight was born on this day in 1941.

J.R. Cobb — member of Classics IV and songwriter of several top-10 hits, including “Stormy” and “Traces” — was born on this day in 1944.

Al Kooper — who started Blood, Sweat & Tears, and did session work on Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” (organ), the Rolling Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” (French horn and piano), the Who, Jimi Hendrix, B.B. King, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Roy Orbison, and many more — is 80.

Christopher Guest, the actor, director, writer and musician — known for his work as guitarist Nigel Tufnel in This is Spinal Tap — is 76.

David Denny from the Steve Miller Band is 76.

Cliff Martinez, former drummer for Red Hot Chili Peppers and Captain Beefheart, is 70.

Vinnie Colaiuta — drummer for Frank Zappa, Joni Mitchell, Sting, and more — is 68.

Duff McKagan, bassist for Guns N' Roses and Velvet Revolver, is 60.

Chris Barron of The Spin Doctors is 56.

Bobby Brown is 55.

Sara Evans is 53.

Kevin Gates is 38.

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