Rock 'n' Roll History for
March 9


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1957 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Fats Domino had the number one record on the Billboard R&B singles chart with "I'm Walkin'", which had just replaced his own "Blue Monday". Domino would keep the Top 40 hits coming for the next five years before fading to the oldies tours.

1959 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
"Venus", by Frankie Avalon, tops the Billboard Hot 100 for the first of five weeks. In 1976, he would issue a new Disco version of the song that would stall at #46 on the Hot 100, but topped the Easy Listening chart, and helped revive his sagging career. About the updated rendition, Avalon would quip, "It was all right, but I still prefer the original."

1960 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The Mystics appeared on American Bandstand where they sang their newest release, "All Through The Night", a follow-up to last year's #20 hit, "Hushabye". Among the group's members was the recently added Paul Simon (aka Jerry Landis), who would leave a few weeks later to pursue other projects.

1961 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The Beatles make their first of over 300 appearance at Liverpool's Cavern Club. The group had played the venue in the past as The Quarry Men.

March 9
Tamla Records releases The Supremes' first single, "I Want A Guy". At that time, the group consisted of Diana Ross, Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson and Barbara Martin. Despite a push from their label, the single would flop, as did their next several records.

1963 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The Beatles appeared at the East Ham Granada in London as a support act for Tommy Roe and Chris Montez.

1964 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Capitol Records releases a song called "Letter To The Beatles" by The Four Preps. The lyrics describe a boy lamenting the fact that he's lost his girlfriend to The Fab Four. On its first day, the record shot to #85 on the Billboard Hot 100 and it looked like The Preps were going to have another hit on their hands. Unfortunately they had included a few bars from "I Want To Hold Your Hand" without permission and Capitol was forced to withdraw the single to avoid a lawsuit. These days you can still find the song on YouTube.

1968 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Grammy Awards are presented to The Fifth Dimension for "Up, Up and Away" - Record of the Year and Best Performance by a Vocal Group. The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is named Album of the Year, Best Contemporary Album, Best Engineered Record and Best Album Cover, Graphic Arts.

March 9
Bob Dylan started a ten-week run at the top of the UK album chart with "John Wesley Harding". The LP would reach #2 in the US.

March 9
The Bubble Gum music craze gets a huge lift when "Simon Says" by The 1910 Fruitgum Company peaks at number 4 on the Billboard chart. Over the next year and a half, the group will have four more US Top 40 hits.

1970 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Having recently changed their name from Earth to Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward make their concert debut at The Roundhouse in the North London district of Camden Town.

1972 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Carole King, James Taylor and Carly Simon did their part to keep Richard Nixon out of office when they appeared at a fund-raiser for George McGovern. Joining them were Barbra Streisand, Quincy Jones, Mama Cass Elliot, Burt Lancaster, Jon Voight, Britt Ekland and Jack Nicholson. Their efforts were in vain, as McGovern lost the November 7th election to Nixon by nearly 18 million votes.

1976 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Queen's fourth studio album, "A Night at the Opera", is certified Gold. It would go on to be a Platinum seller in America with worldwide sales of over six million copies. At the time, it was reported to be the most expensive album ever produced and took its name from the Marx Brothers film A Night at the Opera, which the band watched one night at the studio complex where they were recording.

1977 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The Jacksons' TV show aired for the final time on CBS-TV, finishing dead last in the ratings.

1985 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Mick Jagger releases a solo single called "Just Another Night", which will reach #12 in the US and #32 in the UK. Jagger would be accused of infringing on the copyright of a song titled "Just Another Night" by Patrick Alley, a Jamaican reggae singer from New York. In 1988, a six-member jury ruled in Jagger's favor.

March 9
REO Speedwagon returned to Billboard's top spot with "Can't Fight This Feeling". The song made #16 in the UK. It had been a little over five years since the band's first number one hit, "Keep On Loving You".

1987 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The Songwriters Hall Of Fame inducts Sam Cooke, Gerry Goffin, Carole King, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil, Bob Merrill and Carole Bayer Sager.

1996 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Actor and comedian George Burns, who scored a #49 Billboard hit in 1980 with "I Wish I Was Eighteen Again", died of cardiac arrest at his Beverly Hills home at the age of 100. He was one of the few entertainers whose career successfully spanned vaudeville, film, radio, and television.

2007 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Brad Delp, the lead singer for the band Boston, was found dead in his home in southern New Hampshire. He was 55. The band placed eight songs on the Billboard Hot 100 between 1976 and 1987, including the chart topping "Amanda" in 1986.

2011 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Eric Clapton sold off more than seventy of his guitars at a charity auction in New York. A 1948 Gibson hollow body raised the highest price at $83,000, far above its estimated value of $30,000.

2012 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
76-year-old Jerry Lee Lewis married for the seventh time when he wed his care giver Judith Brown. Lewis split from his sixth wife, Kerrie McCarver in 2004 after twenty years of marriage. Brown, who was fourteen years younger than Lewis, was previously married to the star's cousin Rusty.

2015 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
Gene Patton, better known as Gene Gene the Dancing Machine from his time on the US TV program, The Gong Show, passed away from complications from diabetes at the age of 82.

2016 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
The estate of Elvis Presley filed a law suit against the Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino in a dispute over the late singer's memorabilia after their Elvis attraction closed abruptly earlier this month.

2020 - ClassicBands.com

March 9
A California appellate court upholds a 2016 ruling that Led Zeppelin's "Stairway To Heaven" did not infringe on the Spirit song "Taurus", bringing an end to a lawsuit that was filed in 2014.



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