Rock 'n' Roll History for
March 27


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1952 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Sun Records of Memphis, Tennessee began releasing records. The label would later become the home of Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and many others.

1958 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
CBS Laboratories announces the invention of stereophonic records. Although the new format would be playable on ordinary phonographs, when used on the proper equipment, a new rich and fuller sound would be heard.

1960 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Two anti-payola bills are introduced in US Congress by 71-year-old Representative Emanuel Celler of New York. He blames payola for "the cacophonous music called Rock and Roll," and says that style of music would never have gained popularity, "especially among teenagers," if not for the result of payola.

1961 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
The very first record ever released by Del Shannon, "Runaway" enters the Billboard chart on its way to becoming a million selling, number one hit. In 2004, Rolling Stone rated the song as #466 on their 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

1965 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
The Who released their first US chart entry, "I Can't Explain". Although the song could only climb as high as #93 on the Billboard Hot 100, the band still gained a large following thanks to their exciting live performances.

March 27
British rocker P.J. Proby, who was accused of splitting his skin-tight trousers during performances on several occasions, was ordered off the stage at a municipal ballroom in Hereford, England. Proby would later claim that that real reason he was fired was to make room for Tom Jones, and that his pants actually split at the knees.

1966 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Roy Orbison fell off a motorbike during a UK tour, fracturing his foot. He played the remaining dates sitting on a stool and walking on crutches.

March 27
"Stop In The Name Of Love" by The Supremes reaches the top of the Billboard Hot 100, making them the first group in the history of the chart to enjoy four consecutive number one hits.

1967 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
The Young Rascals record "Groovin" for Atlantic Records. The song would spend four nonconsecutive weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 and became the only hit the group ever had in the United Kingdom, reaching #8 on the UK Singles Chart.

March 27
At a ceremony held at the Playhouse Theatre in London, The Beatles were awarded three Ivor Novello awards: best-selling British single of 1966 - "Yellow Submarine", most-performed song of 1966 - "Michelle", and next-most-performed song - "Yesterday".

March 27
Columbia Records releases "Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits", an LP that contained all of Dylan's Top 40 singles up to that time. The album would go on to be certified five times Platinum by the RIAA, and is his best-selling LP in America. The album cover, designed by Bob Cato using a photo taken by Rowland Scherman, would win a 1967 Grammy Award for Best Album Cover, Photography.

1971 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Three Dog Night's version of Hoyt Axton's "Joy To The World" enters the Billboard Hot 100 on its way to becoming the biggest selling single of the year. Unlike most Three Dog Night songs recorded at that point, instead of having just the three main vocalists singing harmony, the song was recorded with all seven members of the band singing.

March 27
"I Am... I Said" by Neil Diamond entered the Billboard Hot 100 at #45. Climbing the charts slowly, the record would peak at #4 in both the US and the UK.

1972 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Elvis Presley records what proves to be his last Top Ten hit during his lifetime, "Burning Love". Drummer Ronnie Tutt would later recall, "He never felt comfortable with it because he had a hard time with those lyrics." The song would reach #2 on the Billboard Hot 100, #1 on the Cashbox Best Sellers chart, and #7 in the UK. The song's writer, Dennis Linde, later overdubbed the opening guitar riffs into the record's final mix.

1973 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Jerry Garcia of The Grateful Dead is arrested for speeding on the New Jersey turnpike, but the $15 speeding ticket turns into $2,000 bail when the police find a wide variety of drugs in Garcia's car. He spends three hours in jail.

1979 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Eric Clapton married George Harrison's ex-wife, Patti Boyd at the Apostolic Assembly of Faith in Christ Jesus church in Tucson, Arizona. To throw off the press, Clapton's manager, Roger Forrester had booked the event in nearly every church in town. Eric's band and road crew rented black and powder blue tuxedos, but forgot to order shoes, so they showed up wearing their everyday, dirty sneakers.

1981 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Carl Wilson releases his first, self-titled, solo album. Tired of just milking old hits, he was the one member of The Beach Boys that fought hard to keep the band relevant musically all through the early 1970s. Carl started playing small clubs with his new touring band, and eventually got an opening slot with The Doobie Brothers. Unfortunately, his album did not sell well, produced no hit singles, and stalled at #185 on the Billboard 200.

1986 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Sammy Hagar plays his first show as lead singer of Van Halen in Shreveport, Louisiana. Many of the over ten thousand people in attendance wore t-shirts or hoisted banners depicting former front man David Lee Roth's name or photo circled and crossed out.

1995 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Elton John and Tim Rice win the Oscar for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture for "Can You Feel The Love" from The Lion King.

1997 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Ian Dury, the English rocker who initially rose to fame during the late 1970s as founder and lead singer of the British band, Ian Dury And The Blockheads died of colorectal cancer a few weeks short of his 58th birthday.

2003 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
The semi-detached house on Menlove Avenue, Liverpool where John Lennon grew up and wrote some of the early Beatles hits was officially opened to the public by his widow, Yoko Ono. She bought her husband's childhood home in 2002 after its previous owner had passed away. Yoko then donated it to the National Trust to be preserved for the public, and it was then restored to the way it would have looked when Lennon lived there with his Aunt Mimi from the age of five to twenty-three.

2006 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Former Village People policeman Victor Willis was arrested in San Francisco, California, after he disappeared from an ongoing drug and gun trial. Police had charged Willis with being in possession of cocaine and drug paraphernalia in July 2005. He would later be sentenced to three years' probation after he agreed to enter a treatment program.

2007 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Former Jefferson Airplane and Starship singer Grace Slick, along with former manager Bill Thompson, filed a lawsuit in California federal court charging that another former member, Paul Kantner violated both trademark rights and an $80,000 legal settlement he signed in 1985 by using the name Paul Kantner's Starship while touring.

2011 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Dionne Warwick is the fourth contestant fired by Donald Trump on season 11 of The Celebrity Apprentice.

2013 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Gordon Stoker, the tenor voice of The Jordanaires who backed Elvis Presley, Patsy Cline, Jim Reeves and many more, passed away at the age of 88. Estimated sales of records that the vocal group sang on total more than eight billion copies.

2015 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Willie Nelson announced that he and his family were hard at work on a new brand of marijuana called Willie's Reserve. Stores of that same name were being planned and were to include his signature brand and other strains that are grown to meet quality standards.

2017 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
The Foundations lead singer Clem Curtis died of lung cancer at the age of 76. The band is most often remembered for their two biggest hits, "Baby, Now That I've Found You" (#11 in 1968) and "Build Me Up Buttercup" (#3 in 1969).

2019 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
Joe Flannery, an early Beatles' booking manager, passed away at the age of 87. After Brian Epstein asked him to secure some jobs for his new band, Flannery become close friends with John, Paul, George and Pete Best, who were regular visitors to his home. He wrote about his experiences in his autobiography Standing in the Wings: The Beatles, Brian Epstein and Me, published in 2013.

2020 - ClassicBands.com

March 27
As record stores were forced to close due to COVID-19 concerns, and music fans became preoccupied with social distancing and quarantine, recorded music sales dropped off dramatically. Sales of digital albums, CDs, vinyl LPs, and cassettes amounted to just 1.52 million for the previous week, estimated by Billboard to be the lowest total since the mid-1960s.



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