The gymnasium at Miscoe Hill School in tiny Mendon, Mass. (pop: 5,839) may seem like an inauspicious place for rock legends to get their start, but it's where Aerosmith played their first-ever show on Nov. 6, 1970.
For a good long while, everything Paul Simon touched turned to gold or platinum, first during his years as one-half of Simon & Garfunkel, and continuing through a string of successful solo albums. But by the early '80s, he'd hit a bit of a rough spot.
When the Police's debut album came out on Nov. 2, 1978, it sounded like little else on the music landscape at the time. The band was lumped in with punk and burgeoning New Wave groups at the time, but it played a mix of reggae and rock-inspired pop with all the time-shifting complexities found in prog and jazz.
On Nov. 1, 1973, nine months after performing their first show together, Kiss fulfilled an important early career goal by singing their first recording contract.
With the release of 'Wonderwall Music' in November 1968, George Harrison was the first Beatle to step into the spotlight on his own. Recording sessions actually began a year earlier -- when the Beatles were recording their annual Christmas message -- with 'India' and 'Swordfencing,' both working titles that would be changed before release.
'Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park' debuted as an NBC 'Movie of the Week' on Oct. 28, 1978.
The 2005-06 tour featuring former Bad Company frontman Paul Rodgers fronting Queen had been, at best, a head-scratcher. At worst, it was an embarrassing mismatch, since Rodgers' street-wise R&B-laced style was miles away from Queen's super-sized pomp.
An album heralded as a return from born-again proselytizing, the Mark Knopfler-produced 'Infidels' began Bob Dylan's journey back toward mainstream music making — and it may have been even better but for some last-minute tinkering.
As opposed to the marathon session that produced most most of the Beatles' first album, their follow-up, 'With the Beatles,' was recorded during a series of dates in the summer and fall of 1963. The final day of recording took place on the morning of Oct. 23, 1963 at Studio Two at Abbey Road.
The Grateful Dead went three years between studio albums in the period leading up to 'Wake of the Flood.' Over that time, blues-soaked keyboardist Ron "Pigpen" McKernan had died, and his replacement, Keith Godchaux, would take the group into jazzier territory on the 1973 return.