On this day in guitar history
Guitar and bass history, one calendar date at a time. String launches, gear releases, milestone shows, and the artists who made them happen, sourced and dated.
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1938 · 88 yrs ago
88 Years Ago Today: The Stranglers' Founding Drummer Jet Black Was Born
Before he ever sat behind a drum kit, Jet Black ran a fleet of ice cream vans. He co-founded The Stranglers in 1974 in his mid-30s, anchored 23 UK top 40 singles, and kept playing into his late 70s.
1952 · 74 yrs ago
74 Years Ago Today: Session Drummer Mark Craney Was Born
A left-handed drummer from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Mark Craney went from local garage bands to Tommy Bolin's last tour, a Jean-Luc Ponty fusion landmark, a Gino Vannelli Top 5 hit, and a year behind Jethro Tull's kit, all before turning 30.
1953 · 73 yrs ago
73 Years Ago Today: Drumming's Global Ambassador Dom Famularo Was Born
Dom Famularo started drumming at 11, turned pro at 12, and spent more than 40 years teaching students on every continent he could reach, becoming the first Western drummer to run clinics in China along the way.
1958 · 68 yrs ago
68 Years Ago Today: Jazz Bassist David Finck Was Born
David Finck, a jazz bassist equally at home on double bass and electric, was born August 26, 1958. His resume runs from Dizzy Gillespie to Rod Stewart to Andre Previn.
1965 · 61 yrs ago
61 Years Ago Today: Elastica Bassist Annie Holland Was Born
Annie Holland, Elastica's bassist and co-founder, was born August 26, 1965, in London. Her 1995 departure and 1999 return bookended the Britpop band's biggest chart moments.
2000 · 26 yrs ago
26 Years Ago Today: Gov't Mule and Allman Brothers Bassist Allen Woody Was Found Dead
Allen Woody, the Allman Brothers Band's bassist since 1989 and a co-founder of Gov't Mule, was found dead in a Queens hotel on the morning of August 26, 2000. He was 44.
1949 · 77 yrs ago
77 Years Ago Today: KISS Bassist Gene Simmons Is Born in Haifa, Israel
Gene Simmons was born Chaim Witz in Haifa, Israel, and moved to New York at 8. By 1973 he was co-founding KISS, playing bass in fire-breathing demon makeup on an axe-shaped instrument he designed himself.
1962 · 64 yrs ago
64 Years Ago Today: Def Leppard and Dio Guitarist Vivian Campbell Is Born in Belfast
Campbell started on a Telecaster Thinline at 12, joined Ronnie James Dio's band at 20 to play guitar on Holy Diver, and has spent more than three decades since 1992 as Def Leppard's guitarist, replacing the late Steve Clark.
1969 · 57 yrs ago
57 Years Ago Today: Grand Funk Railroad's Debut Album On Time Became 'a Case Study in Early Metal'
Three guys from Flint, Michigan, one guitarist writing every song, no overdub army to hide behind. On Time is the record that started Grand Funk Railroad's run as one of the loudest power trios of its era.
1975 · 51 yrs ago
51 Years Ago Today: Born to Run's $180 Guitar Became as Famous as the Songs
Springsteen's first two albums were critically loved and commercially ignored, and Columbia Records was running out of patience. Born to Run changed that, and its cover turned a battered $180 mutt guitar into one of the most photographed instruments in rock.
1976 · 50 yrs ago
50 Years Ago Today: Boston's Self-Titled Debut Redefines Arena Rock Drumming
Tom Scholz built almost all of Boston's debut himself, in a Massachusetts basement, while letting Epic Records believe he was recording in Los Angeles. The drum credits hide an even stranger story: the player fans picture live wasn't the one who wrote the parts.
1982 · 44 yrs ago
44 Years Ago Today: Alice Cooper's Zipper Catches Skin Was a Blackout He Doesn't Remember Making
Alice Cooper calls Zipper Catches Skin, Special Forces, and DaDa his three 'blackout albums.' He wrote, recorded, and by his own account barely toured them without remembering much of any of it.
1992 · 34 yrs ago
34 Years Ago Today: Eric Clapton's Unplugged Turns 'Layla' Into an Acoustic Shuffle
Eric Clapton taped a small, seated set for MTV's Unplugged series on January 16, 1992. When the album arrived that August, its biggest surprise was 'Layla' remade as a loose acoustic shuffle, driven by drummer Steve Ferrone instead of the song's original, more famous drum part.
1995 · 31 yrs ago
31 Years Ago Today: Billy Joel's Longtime Bassist Doug Stegmeyer Dies at 43
Doug Stegmeyer anchored Billy Joel's band through its biggest run of albums, from Turnstiles to The Bridge, and helped bring both Liberty DeVitto and Russell Javors into the lineup. He died August 25, 1995, at 43.
2006 · 20 yrs ago
20 Years Ago Today: Aerosmith's Tom Hamilton Reveals His Throat Cancer Diagnosis
Tom Hamilton had never missed an Aerosmith show in 36 years. On August 25, 2006, throat and tongue cancer forced the streak to end, and a fill-in bassist took his spot for half a tour.
2014 · 12 yrs ago
12 Years Ago Today: Reggae Percussion Legend Sticky Thompson Dies in Miami
Uziah 'Sticky' Thompson started as a Kingston sound system deejay calling himself 'Cool Sticky.' By the 1970s his congas and hand percussion were on records by The Wailers, Peter Tosh, Black Uhuru, and Grace Jones. He died August 25, 2014, at his Miami home.
1953 · 73 yrs ago
73 Years Ago Today: Wings Drummer Steve Holley Is Born
A chance pub conversation with Denny Laine turned Steve Holley into Wings' drummer within days. He was born August 24, 1953, in London, and went on to play sessions for Paul McCartney, Elton John, Joe Cocker, and Chuck Berry.
1975 · 51 yrs ago
51 Years Ago Today: Queen Begins Recording 'Bohemian Rhapsody'
Freddie Mercury had been carrying pieces of the song since his art-school days. On this day, Queen finally started taping it in three separate chunks at a Welsh farmhouse studio, and nobody involved knew yet how it would sound stitched together.
1979 · 47 yrs ago
47 Years Ago Today: Fingerstyle Guitarist Kaki King Is Born
She started on drums, not guitar, and only came back to the instrument in college. Within a few years she'd turned a single acoustic guitar into something that sounded like a full band, tapping, slapping, and detuning her way onto Rolling Stone's list of new guitar gods.
1981 · 45 yrs ago
45 Years Ago Today: The Rolling Stones Release 'Tattoo You'
The Rolling Stones needed an album to tour behind and didn't have time to write one. So they dug through a decade of unfinished tape, including a reggae jam Keith Richards had once ordered erased, and built their last American number-one album out of leftovers.
1987 · 39 yrs ago
39 Years Ago Today: John Mellencamp's 'The Lonesome Jubilee' Brings Fiddles and Banjos to Rock Radio
A year after testifying to Congress alongside Willie Nelson for Farm Aid, John Mellencamp handed his guitarists a mandolin, a Dobro, and a hammer dulcimer instead of a synthesizer. The result went triple platinum anyway.
1992 · 34 yrs ago
34 Years Ago Today: Session Drummer Larrie Londin, Called 'The Greatest in the World,' Dies at 48
Larrie Londin never planned to be a drummer. A no-show band member at a Norfolk nightclub turned him into one, and he ended up behind the kit for Elvis Presley, B.B. King, Journey, and Nashville's biggest session dates for two decades. He died August 24, 1992, at 48.
2021 · 5 yrs ago
5 Years Ago Today: Rolling Stones Drummer Charlie Watts Dies at 80
Charlie Watts never wanted to be a rock star. He wanted to be a jazz drummer who happened to keep the beat for the biggest band in the world. He died August 24, 2021, at 80, after 58 years behind the Rolling Stones' kit.
1940 · 86 yrs ago
86 Years Ago Today: Dave Clark Five Bassist Rick Huxley, Once Rated Rock's No. 2 Bass Player, Is Born
Rick Huxley switched from guitar to bass to help build the Dave Clark Five's wall-of-sound records. For a few years in the mid-1960s, he was one of the most recognized bass players in rock.
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July 1 · 5 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 1
July 1 spans a century of guitar history. Blues songwriter and bassist Willie Dixon was born in Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1915. The Band released their landmark debut Music from Big Pink in 1968. Bon Jovi signed their first record deal in 1983. Whitesnake and Trapeze guitarist Mel Galley died in 2008. In 2013, Boston's Tom Scholz lost a defamation suit tied to his bandmate's death.
July 3 · 3 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 3
July 3 carries two major rock deaths and one guitarist's birth. Rolling Stones founder and guitarist Brian Jones drowned in 1969, just weeks after leaving the band he started. The Doors' Jim Morrison died in Paris in 1971. And in 1930, session guitarist Tommy Tedesco was born, the Wrecking Crew player behind thousands of Los Angeles recordings and TV themes most guitarists have heard without knowing his name.
July 4 · 3 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 4
July 4 is a birthday for two blues-rooted guitarists a generation apart. Fleetwood Mac founding slide guitarist Jeremy Spencer was born in 1948, and Canned Heat co-founder and guitarist Alan 'Blind Owl' Wilson was born in 1943. In 2009, Drake Levin, guitarist for 1960s hitmakers Paul Revere & the Raiders, died at 62.
July 5 · 3 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 5
July 5 is arguably the single most important date in rock guitar history. At Sun Studio in Memphis in 1954, Elvis Presley, guitarist Scotty Moore, and bassist Bill Black recorded 'That's All Right,' the session widely credited as the birth of rock and roll, with Moore playing his gold-finish Gibson ES-295. Steppenwolf's original lead guitarist, Michael Monarch, was born in 1950, and singer-songwriter Marc Cohn was born in 1959.
July 7 · 4 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 7
July 7 centers on rock's most bittersweet night: Led Zeppelin's final concert, played in West Berlin in 1980, twelve years after the Yardbirds split and sent guitarist Jimmy Page toward his next band. Drummer John Bonham died two months later. Elsewhere on the date, Bruce Springsteen's Born in the U.S.A. hit number one in 1984, Avenged Sevenfold guitarist Synyster Gates was born in 1981, and John Lennon's first solo single reached American radio in 1969.
July 8 · 9 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 8
July 8 holds Jerry Garcia's second-to-last Grateful Dead show in 1995, five weeks before his death, and the first radio play of Elvis Presley's That's All Right in 1954, three days after its Sun Studio session. Jimi Hendrix opened his ill-fated Monkees tour in 1967, Quiet Riot's Carlos Cavazo and country star Toby Keith were born, and Louis Jordan, whom the Rock Hall calls the Grandfather of Rock and Roll, arrived in 1908.
July 15 · 13 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 15
July 15 is a loaded date for guitar history. Instrumental-rock guitarist Joe Satriani was born in 1956, punk pioneer Johnny Thunders and .38 Special's Jeff Carlisi in 1952, and Yes's founding guitarist Peter Banks in 1947. The Rolling Stones' Some Girls hit number one in 1978, the same day Bob Dylan and Eric Clapton shared a bill at Blackbushe Aerodrome, and in 2018, Guns N' Roses' November Rain became the first music video from the 1990s to reach 1 billion YouTube views.
July 16 · 14 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 16
On July 16, guitar history spans a Utah-born Fender Stratocaster pioneer, a genre-defining supergroup, a blues guitar legend's death, and rock's shortest recorded concert. Buddy Merrill, an early Stratocaster face on The Lawrence Welk Show, was born in 1936. Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, and Ginger Baker are widely dated to have formed Cream on this day in 1966. Blues guitarist Johnny Winter died in 2014. The White Stripes played a one-note show in 2007.
July 17 · 8 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 17
On July 17, guitar, bass, and drum history includes Ron Asheton's 1948 birth, Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler's 1949 birth, and the births of drummers Bruce Crump (Molly Hatchet, 1957) and Mick Tucker (Sweet, 1947); Bob Marley and the Wailers recording their Live! album at London's Lyceum in 1975; a 1972 dynamite blast that destroyed the Rolling Stones' touring gear before their Montreal show; Guns N' Roses and Metallica launching their infamous joint stadium tour in 1992; and the 1996 death of Chas Chandler, the talent scout who discovered Jimi Hendrix in a New York club in 1966.
July 18 · 5 events
On This Day in Guitar History: July 18
July 18 spans four decades of guitar history. Blues-rock pioneer Lonnie Mack was born in 1941. The Byrds released Fifth Dimension, built on Roger McGuinn's twelve-string, in 1966. The Beatles cut the first, wildest takes of Helter Skelter, including the longest recording of their career, in 1968. System of a Down's Daron Malakian was born in 1975. Def Leppard played their first-ever show, for five pounds, in 1978.
August 5 · 4 events
On This Day in Guitar and Bass History: August 5
On August 5, three influential bassists were born decades apart: Rick Huxley of the Dave Clark Five (1940), session legend Willie Weeks (1947), and Toto's David Hungate (1948). Randy Jo Hobbs, bassist for The McCoys and the Winter brothers, died on this date in 1993, the same calendar date his old bandmate Rick Derringer was born.
August 24 · 7 events
On This Day in Guitar History: August 24
August 24 carries two of classic rock's biggest landmarks. Queen began recording 'Bohemian Rhapsody' in 1975, and the Rolling Stones released 'Tattoo You,' led by 'Start Me Up,' in 1981. Fingerstyle guitarist Kaki King was born in 1979, and John Mellencamp released 'The Lonesome Jubilee' in 1987. The date is also a somber one for drummers: Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts died in 2021, session legend Larrie Londin died in 1992, and Wings drummer Steve Holley was born in 1953.
August 25 · 10 events
On This Day in Guitar History: August 25
August 25 spans six decades of guitar, bass, and drums history. Grand Funk Railroad released their debut On Time in 1969, and Bruce Springsteen released Born to Run in 1975, its cover built around a $180 Fender Esquire. Alice Cooper released Zipper Catches Skin in 1982, and Def Leppard/Dio guitarist Vivian Campbell was born in 1962. On the rhythm side, Boston's self-titled debut (1976) and Eric Clapton's Unplugged (1992) both carry drummer-focused stories, KISS's Gene Simmons was born in 1949, and Aerosmith's Tom Hamilton, Billy Joel's Doug Stegmeyer, and reggae percussionist Sticky Thompson each have their own August 25 anniversary.