Rock 'n' Roll History for
August 25


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1958 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
A Staten Island, New York doo wop group called The Elegants saw their re-worked version of the Mozart lullaby, "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" hit the top of the US record charts as the re-titled "Little Star". The group spent the following eighteen months milking the song for all it was worth with TV appearances and live shows, but follow up records, "Please Believe Me", "True Love Affair" and "Little Boy Blue" could not match the success of "Little Star". Although The Elegants would be around in one form or another until the 1980s, they never had another hit record.

1962 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
The Four Seasons' "Sherry" enters the Hot 100 at #91. The song will ascend the charts quickly and top both Billboard and the Cash Box Best Sellers list within a month. According to the song's writer, Bob Gaudio, "Sherry" took about fifteen minutes to write and was originally titled "Jackie Baby", in honor of then-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. In 2023 it would be selected for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress.

August 25
After Cameo Records producers passed on the opportunity to have Dee Dee Sharp record a Gerry Goffin / Carole King song called "The Loco-Motion", Don Kirshner at Dimension Records decided to take a chance on it. He liked the demo record's singer, Eva Boyd, who was Goffin and King's babysitter, and had her re-record it. The result was a record that topped the Billboard Hot 100, the Cash Box Best Sellers chart and reached #2 in the UK.

August 25
The New Jersey Doo Wop group, The Duprees saw their debut hit, "You Belong To Me" enter the Billboard Top 40 on its way to #7. They would follow with three more chart makers over the next year and a half.

1963 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Paul McCartney is fined £31 and loses his driver's license for a year after being caught speeding.

1970 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Emerson, Lake And Palmer made their debut at Plymouth Guild Hall in Plymouth, England. During their career the trio would sell over forty million records and place ten albums on the Billboard 200 and the same number on the UK chart.

1973 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Former Left Banke keyboard player Michael Brown led his new group, Stories, back to the top of both the Cash Box Best Sellers chart and the Billboard Hot 100 with a song called "Brother Louie". The gritty lead vocal for the song was supplied by Ian Lloyd, who would later be heard on tracks by Billy Joel, Foreigner and Peter Frampton.

1975 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Bruce Sptingsteen releases his third studio album, "Born To Run". The LP would peak at #3 on the Billboard 200, eventually selling seven million copies in the United States. The single of the same name would rise to #23 in America, but a second release, "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" stalled at #83.

1976 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello premiere their four week Summer variety series on CBS-TV.

August 25
Boston releases their self-titled album, which will become the best-selling, debut Rock album of all time. By 2003 it had sold over seventeen million copies.

1977 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Helen Reddy is appointed to the California State Parks Commission by Governor Jerry Brown.

1979 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Nine weeks after being released, The Knack's infectious tune "My Sharona" reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 where it would remain for six weeks. Billboard magazine would name the record as the number one single of 1979. In the UK it reached number six. The group's lead singer and rhythm guitarist, Doug Fieger would later say that he put words to guitarist Berton Averre's melody in about fifteen minutes, writing about his 17-year-old girlfriend, Sharona Alperin.

August 25
Twenty-five years after his first UK #1 single, Cliff Richard had his 10th chart topper with "We Don't Talk Anymore".

1989 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
John Mellencamp becomes a grandfather at age 38 when his daughter Michelle gives birth to daughter, Elexis Suzanne Peach.

1994 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Jimmy Buffett's Grumman G-44 Widgeon seaplane flips after taking off in Nantucket, Mass. Unharmed, he swims to safety.

August 25
A New York judge officially dissolves the nine year marriage between 45-year-old Billy Joel and 40-year-old Christie Brinkley.

August 25
Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page and Robert Plant reunited at LWT studios in London to tape a set for MTV's Unplugged series, set to air on October 12th. Bassist John Paul Jones was not included.

1997 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Tony Nicole of Tony Records filed a lawsuit against Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of KISS for alleged intentional interference with KISS drummer Peter Criss' contract with the label. The suit maintained that Simmons and Stanley convinced Criss to break his deal.

1999 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Lionel Richie sang under the stars in front of the Giza Pyramids in Egypt as part of a series of big-name concerts to boost the country's sagging tourism industry.

2006 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Dean Martin's daughter, Deana Martin releases her first album, "Memories Are Made of This". The collection featured her versions of many of her father's hits as well as those by Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr. The album was produced by her husband John Griffeth and reached the iTunes Top 10 chart, where it remained for forty weeks throughout 2006 and 2007.

2015 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Iron Maiden unveiled a new Boeing 747-400 Jumbo Jet that will be taking them on tour around the world. Vocalist Bruce Dickinson was in training to fly the plane.

August 25
Paul McCartney announced the addition of five more Autumn concerts to his twenty-two date tour of North America.

2016 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Bruce Springsteen set a personal record for his longest US show when he played for four hours, besting the mark he had set two nights earlier when The E Street Band performed for three hours and fifty-two minutes.

August 25
Trumpeter Herb Alpert donated $10.1 million to Los Angeles City College, allowing the school to provide free tuition as well as private lessons to all its music majors for years to come. Many of the young students were probably unaware that Alpert currently sat at #7 on the list of the top Billboard 200 album artists of all time.

2021 - ClassicBands.com

August 25
Benny Andersson & Björn Ulvaeus' musical Mamma Mia!, featuring the songs of ABBA, re-opens at the Novello Theatre in London's West End, after COVID-19 interruption stopped performances in March of 2020.



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