Chapter 01 — Today in music
On a day like today November 30
1982
“Thriller” is released, the best-selling album of all time
Michael Jackson releases “Thriller”, produced by Quincy Jones. With “Billie Jean”, “Beat It” and the video that revolutionized MTV, it became the best-selling album in history, with numbers no record will reach again in the streaming era. More than a hit, it was the moment pop became a truly planetary phenomenon.
Michael Jackson
1911
Jorge Negrete is born: the conservatoire tenor who became the singing charro
On November 30, 1911, Jorge Negrete was born in Guanajuato. He studied classical singing and made his radio debut as a tenor of the classical repertoire. Mexican cinema turned him into something else: the singing charro, in an embroidered suit with an enormous voice, a character that defined the image of Mexico for half the world. He led the actors' union and died in 1953, aged 41, married to María Félix.
Jorge Negrete
María Félix
1915
Brownie McGhee is born: the other half of the longest-running duo in blues
On November 30, 1915, Brownie McGhee was born in Tennessee. As a child he contracted polio and was left with one leg shorter than the other; his father bought him a guitar so he would have a trade he could do sitting down. In 1942 he met the blind harmonica player Sonny Terry and they formed a duo that lasted thirty-five years and carried rural blues to college audiences and folk festivals.
Brownie McGhee
Sonny Terry
1937
Luther Ingram is born, who sang about infidelity with no apology and went to number one
On November 30, 1937, Luther Ingram was born in Tennessee and raised in Illinois singing in a family gospel group. In 1972 he recorded "(If Loving You Is Wrong) I Don't Want to Be Right", the story of a married man who intends to leave neither his wife nor his lover, told without a single apology. It was number one on the soul chart for a month and one of the most covered songs of the decade.
Luther Ingram
1955
Billy Idol is born, the punk who learned to smile at MTV
William Broad, aka Billy Idol, is born in Stanmore, England, emerging from London's first punk wave with Generation X. He moved to New York and turned punk disdain into video aesthetics: “White Wedding” and “Rebel Yell” ruled MTV with his sneer and raised fist. He was the perfect bridge between the grime of '77 and the gloss of the eighties.
Billy Idol
1909
Robert Nighthawk is born: the slide player Muddy Waters copied and hardly anyone remembers
On November 30, 1909, Robert McCollum was born in Arkansas and took his stage name from one of his own songs about a night bird. His way of playing slide — clean, precise, without the clamour of others — directly influenced Muddy Waters and Earl Hooker. He never had a steady contract and played Chicago's Maxwell Street on Sundays, with an amplifier plugged into a cable on the pavement.
Robert Nighthawk
Muddy Waters
1945
Vani Jairam is born, who recorded ten thousand songs in nineteen languages
On November 30, 1945, Vani Jairam was born in southern India. She was working at a bank when she moved to Bombay and decided to study singing seriously. She became one of the most prolific playback voices in Indian cinema: some ten thousand recorded songs in nineteen different languages are credited to her, across five decades, and she won three national film awards.
Vani Jairam
1953
June Pointer is born: the youngest sister and the first to step onto a stage
On November 30, 1953, June Pointer was born in Oakland, youngest of the four sisters raised by two ministers who allowed them to sing only in church. She was the first to disobey: she started singing in clubs with Bonnie and the other two followed. With the Pointer Sisters she won three Grammy awards in three different genres, something close to unique. She died in 2006, aged 52.
June Pointer
The Pointer Sisters
1953
Shuggie Otis is born, who turned down the Rolling Stones and disappeared for thirty years
On November 30, 1953, Shuggie Otis was born in Los Angeles, son of the musician and talent scout Johnny Otis. At fifteen he was playing on other people's records and at twenty-one he made "Inspiration Information", an album full of drum machines and layered guitars that nobody understood in 1974. He turned down an invitation to join the Rolling Stones and withdrew from the industry for decades.
Shuggie Otis
The Brothers Johnson
1968
Des'ree is born, whose song about endurance became a sung self-help manual
On November 30, 1968, Desirée Weeks was born in London, to a Barbadian father and a Guyanese mother, and spent part of her childhood in Barbados. In 1994 she recorded "You Gotta Be", a song of direct advice with no metaphors that became a lasting phenomenon: it moved in and out of the American charts for two years. She also sang on the soundtrack of the modern film version of "Romeo and Juliet".
Des'ree
One ephemeris a day, one editorial a week. Zero spam, pure archive.