This Day in Music
Jump into your car and drive, but don't forget to take the radio head when you arrive, and watch for Elvis's beard, on this day in music.
Releases
1984: Boston rockers The Cars release their fifth studio album, “Heartbeat City.” Though the band's prior two albums, “Shake it Up” and “Panorama,” were commercially successful Platinum-certified records, critics were not impressed and the albums didn't perform as well as their first two.
The fifth record was therefore somewhat of a comeback attempt, with the band opting to change producers in an effort to “shake up” their sound. Going with Robert “Mutt” Lange, famous for producing AC/DC, Foreigner, Def Leppard and Boomtown Rats, the change proved to be “just what they needed,” and “Heartbeat City” was a blockbuster.
Earning widespread acclaim from critics, including a 5-Star compilation by AllMusic, three of the album's singles hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts: “You Might Think,” “Magic,” and the Benjamin Orr lead vocal, “Drive,” the LP’s most successful cut. The album peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 and No. 1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. In the U.S. it was certified 4x Platinum, ultimately selling five million copies worldwide.
1995: The second studio album from British rock band Radiohead is released. Titled “The Bends,” its arrangements were more restrained than the debut, “Pablo Honey,” and its lyrics were cryptic, with the music having an acoustic and ballad-driven approach.
Critics were split in their appraisals. The Guardian, NME, and Q, all based in England, rated it with near-full marks, whereas American-based Rolling Stone, Spin, and the Village Voice, all but panned it. The record-buying public seemed to be divided along the same national boundaries, though not nearly as severely, with the record peaking at No. 4 on the U.K. Albums Chart, and being certified 4x Platinum, and reaching No. 88 on the Billboard 200, but still earning Platinum certification, which is objectively a commercial hit.
The album spun-out six singles in an attempt to recapture the unexpected success of the song “Creep” from the first album. Only one made the Top-10. “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” reached No. 5 on the U.K. Singles chart, though the song “High and Dry” earned modest international fame despite its lacklustre chart performance. Their next album, “OK Computer,” would be huge.
Events
1971: The Allman Brothers Band, aka the best blues-based jam band in Rock and Roll history, performs their second of two dates at promoter Bill Graham's famous Fillmore East nightclub in Manhattan's East Village neighbourhood. The band would release a landmark double-live album recorded during these shows on July 6, 1971. This Day in Music will commemorate that album in about four months.
The Friday Frank
1988: At the Springfield, MA Civic Center, Frank Zappa performs with “The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life,” a dozen highly-talented musicians comprised of FZ himself on guitar, vocals, and Synclavier, Ike Willis (g; vox), Mike Keneally (g; key; vox), Robert Martin (key; sax; vox), Scott Thunes (bg; key), Chad Wackerman (d), Ed Mann (perc), Walt Fowler (t; fl; key), Paul Carmen (as; ss; bs), Albert Wing (ts), and Kurt McGettrick (bs).
Though not the official group name, “The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life” was one of four live albums produced from the tour and references FZ’s premature cancellation of the U.S. leg due to discord in the band.
The March 13, 1988 show was a 21-song marathon that featured the classic FZ tracks “A Pound for A Brown on the Bus,” “The Illinois Enema Bandit,” “Sofa,” “Peaches en Regalia,” “Joe’s Garage,” and “Truck Driver Divorce,” along with specially-curated medleys of FZ songs and arrangements like “Packard Goose/Royal March from L'Histoire du Soldat/Béla Bartók's Piano Concerto no. 3” and “Norwegian Jim/Louisiana Hooker With Herpes/Texas Motel,” a scathing lampoon of televangelist Jimmy Swaggert, a frequent target of Zappa’s ire (with good reason).
The band also performed some unexpected cover tunes, including Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven,” The Beatles’ “I Am the Walrus,” and the Cory & Cross pop classic, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.”
The Daily Elvis
1969: The movie Charro! is released by National General Pictures. Starring Elvis Presley with facial hair, it's a non-musical western. It is the only one of Elvis's movies in which he did not sing on screen.
Pictured: Is bearded-Elvis even more handsome than normal-Elvis?
