Chapter 01 — Today in music
On a day like today October 31
1975
Queen releases “Bohemian Rhapsody”, the song that broke every rule
Queen releases “Bohemian Rhapsody” in the UK: six minutes of ballad, opera and hard rock the label deemed unplayable on radio. Freddie Mercury refused to cut a single second, and the song spent nine weeks at number one in Britain. Its promo film also anticipated the MTV era: the perfect single didn't exist, so Queen invented it.
Queen
1939
Ali Farka Touré is born, who showed that the blues had come out of Africa
On October 31, 1939, Ali Farka Touré was born in Mali, a farmer who played guitar in his spare time. When he first heard John Lee Hooker he thought it was Malian music badly translated; from then on he devoted his life to showing that Mississippi blues had come from the banks of the Niger. He won two Grammys, kept growing rice between tours and served as mayor of his home town.
Ali Farka Touré
Ry Cooder
1952
Bernard Edwards is born, owner of the bassline that founded hip-hop by accident
On October 31, 1952, Bernard Edwards was born in North Carolina, the quiet half of Chic alongside Nile Rodgers. His bass on "Good Times" was copied wholesale by the Sugarhill Gang for "Rapper's Delight" and became the most sampled fragment in popular music. With Rodgers he produced Sister Sledge and Diana Ross. He died in Tokyo in 1996 of pneumonia, hours after finishing a concert.
Bernard Edwards
Nile Rodgers
Chic
1963
Johnny Marr is born, the guitarist who made the Smiths weep and dance
Johnny Marr is born in Manchester: the sonic architect of The Smiths. His crystalline arpeggios on “This Charming Man” and “How Soon Is Now?” proved that in the synthesizer era the guitar could be modern without a single solo. After the split, he became British rock's most coveted collaborator, from The The to Modest Mouse.
Johnny Marr
The Smiths
1902
Julia Lee is born, who sang risqué songs and played at the White House
On October 31, 1902, Julia Lee was born in Kansas City, a pianist and singer specialising in a repertoire of double meanings that radio stations could not programme. She summed up her own career by saying she sang songs the ladies did not like. She had several hits on the rhythm and blues charts of the forties and, despite all that material, was invited to play at Harry Truman's White House.
Julia Lee
1922
Illinois Jacquet is born, author of the sax solo that opened the door to rock and roll
On October 31, 1922, Jean-Baptiste Jacquet was born in Louisiana and raised in Houston. In 1942, aged nineteen, he recorded a saxophone solo on "Flying Home" with Lionel Hampton's orchestra that broke every rule of jazz: it screamed, repeated notes and went after a physical reaction from the audience. Musicians copied it for years, and that way of playing became the sound of rhythm and blues and rock.
Illinois Jacquet
Lionel Hampton
1961
Larry Mullen Jr. is born, who put up the notice that produced U2
On October 31, 1961, Larry Mullen Jr. was born in Dublin, drummer and founder of U2 in the most literal way: in 1976 he pinned a note to his school noticeboard looking for musicians to form a band. Seven people turned up in his kitchen. The group was briefly called The Larry Mullen Band, until Bono arrived and, as Mullen himself tells it, within minutes it no longer was.
Larry Mullen Jr.
U2
1966
Ad-Rock is born, of the punk band that became rap's first white group
On October 31, 1966, Adam Horovitz was born in New York, son of a playwright. He joined the Beastie Boys when they were still a teenage hardcore band and was there when they switched to rap. In 1986 "Licensed to Ill" became the first hip-hop album to reach number one in the United States. Years later they publicly apologised for the misogyny of those lyrics and changed course.
Ad-Rock
Beastie Boys
1980
Alondra de la Parra is born, who founded an orchestra at twenty-three to play Latin American music
On October 31, 1980, Alondra de la Parra was born in New York to Mexican parents. At twenty-three, fed up that the Latin American repertoire never appeared in American concert halls, she founded her own orchestra to play it. She was the first Mexican woman to conduct in New York and took Revueltas, Márquez and Chávez to audiences who did not know they existed.
Alondra de la Parra
1990
JID is born: the football player who lost his scholarship and started rapping
On October 31, 1990, Destin Route was born in Atlanta, the seventh of seven children. He entered university on a sports scholarship and lost it for indiscipline; left without a plan, he began recording songs in the house he shared with other musicians. His rapping, extremely fast and pitched high, caught J. Cole's attention, and he was signed to his label in 2017.
JID
J. Cole
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