April 5, 1994: Nirvana frontman, Kurt Cobain is found dead of an apparent suicide.
April 7, 1943: Albert Hofman creates LSD (lysergic acid diethlamide) in a laboratory in Switzerland. LSD will later play a major role in the creative development of music in the 1960′s.
April 10, 1970: Paul McCartney announces he’s leaving the Beatles.
April 11, 1961: Bob Dylan performs his first professional gig (at Gerde’s Folk City, Greenwich, NY). The set list includes “Blowin’ In the Wind.”
April 14, 1980: The first rock home video, a Gary Numan concert, is released on videocassette.
April 17, 1964: The Rolling Stones’ debut album is released on Decca Records, in England.
April 24, 1959: The Drifters’ “There Goes My Baby” is released. It is the first rock & roll song to contain a string section.
April 25, 1956: “Heartbreak Hotel” is the #1 single in the US, bringing Elvis Presley his first hit record.
April 25, 1979: The FBI confiscates $1 million in pirated 8-track tapes during an anti-piracy raid covering 4 states.
April 29, 1971: Bill Graham announces the upcoming closures of the Fillmore East (NY) and Fillmore West in San Francisco.
April 30, 1968: Frankie Lyman dies of a heroin overdoes at the age of 25. His career had begun at age 14.
Happy Birthday:
April 7: Billie Holiday (Considered to be the greatest female blues vocalist of all time, b. 1915 Baltimore, MD).
April 7: John Oates (b. 1949 New York, NY).
April 9: Gerard Way (My Chemical Romance b. 1977)
April 11: Chris Gaylor (All American Rejects b. 1979)
April 21: Iggy Pop (b. James Jewel Osterberg, 1947 Ann Arbor, MI).
April 24: Usher (b. 1966)
April 24: Kelly Clarkson (b. 1982)
April 24: Tyson Ritter (All American Rejects b. 1984)
April 27: Ace Frehley (b. Paul Frehley, 1951 Bronx, NY).