Rock and Roll

MY ALL TIME FAVORITE BAND !!!

WOW.....My early years in life 19-25 were spent around the Boyzz, We would see them sometimes as many as 4 times a week, In this time we became good friends which just added to the magic their show would bring,Dirt who was not only a show stopper But a true musician Gil and Mike matching their guitar prowess was amazing, then Dave on the "Wild Bass" and Anatole and Kent on keys and drums.. What an awesome experience!!One that has carried memories thru the last 30 years !!!!!

Not to be confused with the British punk band Boys, the American clod rock of the Boyzz brought biker imagery, a bit of Godz blasphemy, and the heavy boogie of Black Oak Arkansas to the late-'70s commercial party. The Boyzz were vocalist "Dirty" Dan Buck, keyboardist Anatole Halinkovich (now Tony Hall), guitarists Gil Pini and Mike Tafoya, bassist Dave Angel, plus drummer Kent Cooper. The ruckus of their first and only slab, Too Wild to Tame, caused tremors throughout the heartland and is now something of a lost metal curio. But lack of intellectualism and record sales caught up to the band, with Halinkovich, Tafoya, and Angel clearing out and cleaning up to become the ace pop act B'zz. Around the turn of the century, Tafoya, Buck, and Angel re-formed the Boyzz.Who later have transformed in to bands Like , The B'ZZ, Deluxery and Dirts Raiders, Now My old friend Dirty Dan Buck is still out there rockin the Chicago music scene like no on has since 1976, These were the days of 4 nites a week of the Boyzz and travelling to Wisconsin, Indiana and Beyond for many years and many weekend, Better memories could not have been bought !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Eric Patrick Clapton was born on March 30, 1945, in Surrey, England. He was the illegitimate son of Patricia Molly Clapton and Edward Fryer, a Canadian soldier stationed in England. After W.W.II, Fryer returned to his wife in Canada, Patricia left Eric in the custody of his grandparents, Rose and Jack Clapp. (The surname Clapton is from Rose's first husband, Reginald Cecil Clapton.) Patricia moved to Germany where she eventually married another Canadian soldier, Frank McDonald.

Eric, who was called "Ricky" by his grandparents, was a quiet and polite child, an above average student with an aptitude for art. He was raised believing that his grandparents were his parents and his mother was his sister, to shield him the stigma that illegitimacy carried with it. The truth was eventually revealed to him at the age of nine by his grandmother. Later, when Eric would visit his mother, they would still pretend to be brother and sister.

As an youngster, Clapton's first exposure to rock and roll was a Jerry Lee Lewis appearance on British television. Lewis' explosive performance, coupled with young Eric's emerging love of the blues and American R&B, inspired him to learn to play guitar. Eric enrolled at the Kingston College of Art, but was soon expelled for playing guitar in class.

At seventeen, he took a job as a manual labourer and spent most of his free time playing the electric guitar he persuaded his grandparents to purchase for him. In time, Clapton joined a number of British blues bands, including the Roosters and Casey Jones, and eventually rose to prominence as a member of the Yardbirds, whose line-up would eventually include all three British guitar heroes of the sixties: Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck. The group became a sensation for their blues-tinged rock, as did the budding guitar virtuoso Clapton, who earned the nickname "Slowhand" because his forceful string-bending often resulted in broken guitar strings, which he would replace onstage while the crowd engaged in a slow hand-clapping.

Despite the popularity of the band's first two albums, "Five Live Yardbirds" and "For Your Love", Clapton left in 1965 because he felt the band was veering away from blues in favour of a more commercially viable pop focus. He joined John Mayall's Bluesbreakers and his talent blossomed at an accelerated rate. He quickly became the defining musical force of the group. "Clapton is God" was the hue and cry of a fanatic following that propelled the band's Bluesbreakers album to No. 6 on the English pop charts.

Clapton parted company with the Bluesbreakers in mid-1966 to form his own band, "Cream", with bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker. With this line-up, Clapton sought "to start a revolution in musical thought, to change the world, to upset people and to shock them." His vision was more than met as Cream quickly became the pre-eminent rock trio of the late sixties. On the strength of their first three albums (Fresh Cream, Disraeli Gears, and Wheels of Fire) and extensive touring, the band achieved a level of international fame approaching that of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and Clapton became even more almighty in the minds of his fans. Drug abuse and inflated egos eventually led to a split of the band and to a farewell tour in 1968 as well as the release of the Goodbye album in 1969.

Early in 1969, Clapton united with Baker, bassist Rick Grech, and Steve Winwood, formerly of The Spencer Davis Group and Traffic, to record one album as Blind Faith, rock's first "supergroup." In support of their self-titled album, Blind Faith set out on a sold-out, twenty-four-city American tour, the stress of which resulted in the demise of the band less than a year after its inception.

Clapton kept busy for a time as an occasional guest player with Delaney and Bonnie, the husband-and-wife team that had been Blind Faith's opening act during their tour. A disappointing live album and the single, "Never Ending Love" were released in 1970, as was Clapton's self-titled solo debut. That album featured three other musicians--bassist Carl Radle, keyboardist Bobby Whitlock, and drummer Jim Gordon, from Delaney's band, and yielded a modest pop hit with Clapton's version of J.J. Cale's "After Midnight." The four eventually called themselves Derek and the Dominos, and recorded Clapton's double album "Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs", with the added contribution of slide guitarist Duane Allman. An anguished lament of unrequited love, "Layla" was inspired by a difficult love triangle between Clapton, his close friend George Harrison, and Harrison's wife Pattie (she and Clapton eventually married in 1979 and divorced in 1988). Unfortunately, personal struggles and career pressure on the guitarist led to a major heroin addiction. Derek and the Dominos crumbled during the course of an American tour and an aborted attempt to record a second album.

Clapton withdrew from the spotlight in the early seventies, wallowing in his addiction and then struggling to conquer it. Following the advice of the Who's Pete Townsend, he underwent a controversial but effective electro-acupuncture treatment and was fully rehabilitated. He rebounded creatively with a role in the film version of Townsend's rock opera, Tommy, and with a string of albums, including the reggae-influenced 461 Ocean Boulevard, which yielded a chart-topping single cover of Bob Marley's "I Shot the Sheriff." Some critics and fans were disappointed by Clapton's post-rehab efforts, feeling that he had abandoned his former guitar-heavy approach in favour of a more laid-back and vocal-conscious one.

"Just One Night", Clapton's 1980 live album, reminded fans just exactly who their guitar hero was, but unfortunately, this period marked Clapton's slide into a serious drinking problem that eventually hospitalized him for a time in 1981. He experienced a creative resurgence after overcoming his alcoholism, releasing a string of consistently successful albums - "Another Ticket" (1981), "Money and Cigarettes" (1983), "Behind the Sun" (1985), "August" (1986), "Journeyman" (1989) and turning his personal life around. Though some say Clapton never regained the musical heights of his heroin days, his legend nevertheless continued to grow. That he was a paragon of rock became more than apparent when Polygram released a rich four-CD retrospective of his career, "Crossroads", in 1988; the set scored Grammy awards for Best Historical Album and Best Liner Notes.

In late 1990, the fates delivered Clapton a terrible blow when guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and Clapton road crew members Colin Smythe and Nigel Browne - all close friends of Clapton's - were killed in a helicopter crash. A few months later, he was dealt another cruel blow when Conor, his son by Italian model Lori Del Santo, fell forty-nine stories from Del Santo's Manhattan high-rise apartment to his death. Clapton channelled his shattering grief into writing the heart-wrenching 1992 Grammy-winning tribute to his son, "Tears in Heaven." (Clapton received a total of six Grammys that year for the single and for the album "Unplugged".)

In 1994, he began once again to play traditional blues; the album, "From the Cradle", marked a return to raw blues standards and it hit with critics and fans. Clapton showed no signs of slowing down: in February of 1997 he picked up Record of the Year and Best Male Pop Vocal Performance Grammys for "Change the World," from the soundtrack of the John Travolta movie "Phenomenon". The year 2000 saw Clapton's "My Father's Eyes" climb the charts, to score another hit for the legendary guitarist.

In his 40-year-plus career, Eric Clapton has rolled up plenty of honors - numerous hits, 18 Grammys and becoming the first musician inducted three times into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

PINK FLOYD is the premier space rock band. Since the mid-'60s, their music relentlessly tinkered with electronics and all manner of special effects to push pop formats to


their outer limits. At the same time they wrestled with lyrical themes and concepts of such massive scale that their music has taken on almost classical, operatic quality, in both sound and words. Despite their astral image, the group was brought down to earth in the 1980s by decidedly mundane power struggles over leadership and, ultimately, ownership of the band's very name. After that time, they were little more than a dinosaur act, capable of filling stadiums and topping the charts, but offering little more than a spectacular recreation of their most successful formulas. Their latter-day staleness cannot disguise the fact that, for the first decade or so of their existence, they were one of the most innovative groups around, in concert and (especially) in the studio.


While Pink Floyd are mostly known for their grandiose concept albums of the 1970s, they started as a very different sort of psychedelic band. Soon after they first began playing together in the mid-'60s, they fell firmly under the leadership of lead guitarist Syd Barrett, the gifted genius who would write and sing most of their early material. The Cambridge native shared the stage with Roger Waters (bass), Rick Wright (keyboards), and Nick Mason (drums). The name Pink Floyd, seemingly so far-out, was actually derived from the first names of two ancient bluesmen (Pink Anderson and Floyd Council). And at first, Pink Floyd were much more conventional than the act into which they would evolve, concentrating on the rock and R&B material that were so common to the repertoires of mid-'60s British bands.


Pink Floyd quickly began to experiment, however, stretching out songs with wild instrumental freak-out passages incorporating feedback; electronic screeches; and unusual, eerie sounds created by loud amplification, reverb, and such tricks as sliding ball bearings up and down guitar strings. In 1966, they began to pick up a following in the London underground; on-stage, they began to incorporate light shows to add to the psychedelic effect. Most importantly, Syd Barrett began to compose pop-psychedelic gems that combined unusual psychedelic arrangements (particularly in the haunting guitar and celestial organ licks) with catchy melodies and incisive lyrics that viewed the world with a sense of poetic, childlike wonder.


The group landed a recording contract with EMI in early 1967 and made the Top 20 with a brilliant debut single, "Arnold Layne," a sympathetic, comic vignette about a transvestite. The follow-up, the kaleidoscopic "See Emily Play," made the Top Ten. The debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, also released in 1967, may have been the greatest British psychedelic album other than Sgt. Pepper's. Dominated almost wholly by Barrett's songs, the album was a charming fun house of driving, mysterious rockers ("Lucifer Sam"); odd character sketches ("The Gnome"); childhood flashbacks ("Bike," "Matilda Mother"); and freakier pieces with lengthy instrumental passages ("Astronomy Domine," "Interstellar Overdrive," "Pow R Toch") that mapped out their fascination with space travel. The record was not only like no other at the time; it was like no other that Pink Floyd would make, colored as it was by a vision that was far more humorous, pop-friendly, and lighthearted than those of their subsequent epics.


The reason Pink Floyd never made a similar album was that Piper was the only one to be recorded under Barrett's leadership. Around mid-1967, the prodigy began showing increasingly alarming signs of mental instability. Barrett would go catatonic on-stage, playing music that had little to do with the material, or not playing at all. An American tour had to be cut short when he was barely able to function at all, let alone play the pop star game. Dependent upon Barrett for most of their vision and material, the rest of the group was nevertheless finding him impossible to work with, live or in the studio.


Around the beginning of 1968, guitarist Dave Gilmour, a friend of the band who was also from Cambridge, was brought in as a fifth member. The idea was that Gilmour would enable the Floyd to continue as a live outfit; Barrett would still be able to write and contribute to the records. That couldn't work either, and within a few months Barrett was out of the group. Pink Floyd's management, looking at the wreckage of a band that was now without its lead guitarist, lead singer, and primary songwriter, decided to abandon the group and manage Barrett as a solo act.


Such calamities would have proven insurmountable for 99 out of 100 bands in similar predicaments. Incredibly, Pink Floyd would regroup and not only maintain their popularity, but eventually become even more successful. It was early in the game yet, after all; the first album had made the British Top Ten, but the group was still virtually unknown in America, where the loss of Syd Barrett meant nothing to the media. Gilmour was an excellent guitarist, and the band proved capable of writing enough original material to generate further ambitious albums, Waters eventually emerging as the dominant composer. The 1968 follow-up to Piper at the Gates of Dawn, A Saucerful of Secrets, made the British Top Ten, using Barrett's vision as an obvious blueprint, but taking a more formal, somber, and quasi-classical tone, especially in the long instrumental parts. Barrett, for his part, would go on to make a couple of interesting solo records before his mental problems instigated a retreat into oblivion.


Over the next four years, Pink Floyd would continue to polish their brand of experimental rock, which married psychedelia with ever-grander arrangements on a Wagnerian operatic scale. Hidden underneath the pulsing, reverberant organs and guitars and insistently restated themes were subtle blues and pop influences that kept the material accessible to a wide audience. Abandoning the singles market, they concentrated on album-length works, and built a huge following in the progressive rock underground with constant touring in both Europe and North America. While LPs like Ummagumma (divided into live recordings and experimental outings by each member of the band), Atom Heart Mother (a collaboration with composer Ron Geesin), and More... (a film soundtrack) were erratic, each contained some extremely effective music.


By the early '70s, Syd Barrett was a fading or nonexistent memory for most of Pink Floyd's fans, although the group, one could argue, never did match the brilliance of that somewhat anomalous 1967 debut. Meddle (1971) sharpened the band's sprawling epics into something more accessible, and polished the science fiction ambience that the group had been exploring ever since 1968. Nothing, however, prepared Pink Floyd or their audience for the massive mainstream success of their 1973 album, Dark Side of the Moon, which made their brand of cosmic rock even more approachable with state-of-the-art production; more focused songwriting; an army of well-time stereophonic sound effects; and touches of saxophone and soulful female backup vocals.


Dark Side of the Moon finally broke Pink Floyd as superstars in the United States, where it made number one. More astonishingly, it made them one of the biggest-selling acts of all time. Dark Side of the Moon spent an incomprehensible 741 weeks on the Billboard album chart. Additionally, the primarily instrumental textures of the songs helped make Dark Side of the Moon easily translatable on an international level, and the record became (and still is) one of the most popular rock albums worldwide.


It was also an extremely hard act to follow, although the follow-up, Wish You Were Here (1975), also made number one, highlighted by a tribute of sorts to the long-departed Barrett, "Shine On You Crazy Diamond." Dark Side of the Moon had been dominated by lyrical themes of insecurity, fear, and the cold sterility of modern life; Wish You Were Here and Animals (1977) developed these morose themes even more explicitly. By this time Waters was taking a firm hand over Pink Floyd's lyrical and musical vision, which was consolidated by The Wall (1979).


The bleak, overambitious double concept album concerned itself with the material and emotional walls modern humans build around themselves for survival. The Wall was a huge success (even by Pink Floyd's standards), in part because the music was losing some of its heavy-duty electronic textures in favor of more approachable pop elements. Although Pink Floyd had rarely even released singles since the late '60s, one of the tracks, "Another Brick in the Wall," became a transatlantic number one. The band had been launching increasingly elaborate stage shows throughout the '70s, but the touring production of The Wall, featuring a construction of an actual wall during the band's performance, was the most excessive yet.


In the 1980s, the group began to unravel. Each of the four had done some side and solo projects in the past; more troublingly, Waters was asserting control of the band's musical and lyrical identity. That wouldn't have been such a problem had The Final Cut (1983) been such an unimpressive effort, with little of the electronic innovation so typical of their previous work. Shortly afterward, the band split up -- for a while. In 1986, Waters was suing Gilmour and Mason to dissolve the group's partnership (Wright had lost full membership status entirely); Waters lost, leaving a Roger-less Pink Floyd to get a Top Five album with Momentary Lapse of Reason in 1987. In an irony that was nothing less than cosmic, about 20 years after Pink Floyd shed their original leader to resume their career with great commercial success, they would do the same again to his successor. Waters released ambitious solo albums to nothing more than moderate sales and attention, while he watched his former colleagues (with Wright back in tow) rescale the charts.


Pink Floyd still had a huge fan base, but there's little that's noteworthy about their post-Waters output. They knew their formula, could execute it on a grand scale, and could count on millions of customers -- many of them unborn when Dark Side of the Moon came out, and unaware that Syd Barrett was ever a member -- to buy their records and see their sporadic tours. The Division Bell, their first studio album in seven years, topped the charts in 1994 without making any impact on the current rock scene, except in a marketing sense. Ditto for the live Pulse album, recorded during a typically elaborately staged 1994 tour, which included a concert version of The Dark Side of the Moon in its entirety. Waters' solo career sputtered along, highlighted by a solo recreation of The Wall, performed at the site of the former Berlin Wall in 1990, and released as an album. Syd Barrett continued to be completely removed from the public eye except as a sort of archetype for the fallen genius

The story of the most successful rock group in history is much to long to cover .

Here is a brief biography in "time line" form.

March, 1957: John Lennon forms a skiffle group called The Black Jacks. The name later changes to the Quarry Men.

July 6, 1957: John meets Paul McCartney through their mutual friend, Ivan Vaughan at a church function.

July 20, 1957: Paul is invited to join the Quarry Men.

October 18, 1957: Paul plays his first live gig with the band at the New Clubmore Hall in Liverpool. Playing lead, his performance was so weak, he is demoted to rhythm guitar.

February 6, 1958: 15 year old George Harrison meets the Quarry Men. Impressed with his guitar skills, the others invite him to join the band.

March 25, 1959: Ringo joins Rory Storm and the Hurricanes.

August 29, 1959: The Quarry Men, consisting of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ken Brown play at the Casbah, a club owned by Pete Best's mother.

October 10, 1959: After seven gigs at the Casbah, Ken Brown leaves the group.

November 15, 1959: John, Paul, and George play as a trio, calling themselves Johnny & the Moondogs. They still have no drummer, but pass an audition for Carroll Levis' TV Star Search at Liverpool's Empire Theatre.

January 1960: Stuart Sutcliffe, a friend of John Lennon, joins the trio after selling one of his paintings and using the money to buy a bass guitar.

May 1960: The group began to call themselves the Beatals. (note the odd spelling)

May 1960: The band is joined by drummer Tommy Moore and change their name to the Silver Beetles. Moore only played with them for a short while. During that time period, they auditioned for Larry Parnes and appeared on a small tour of Scotland backing singer Johnny Gentle.

July 1960: Norman Chapman becomes the next drummer, but was called up for National Service. This causes problems for the Silver Beetles, who had dates booked in Hamburg, Germany, and were playing for Allan Williams at the Jacaranda Club and the New Cabaret Artistes Club. Williams also acquired other bookings for the band at the Grosvenor Ballroom. The band would once again change their name, this time to the Silver Beatles.

August 12, 1960: Pete Best took over the drum seat and the name The Beatles was born. Between this date and December 1962, the group would play gigs at the Indra, Kaiserkeller, Top Ten and Star clubs.

December 27, 1960: After returning to Liverpool, The Beatles played at Litherland Town Hall, prompting fan frenzy.

February 9, 1961: The Beatles perform for the first time at the Cavern Club, in a lunchtime performance.

March 21, 1961: The band plays their first evening gig at the Cavern Club.

Spring 1961: Stuart Sutcliffe, suffering from increasingly bad headaches, quits the Beatles.

June 22 / 23 1961: The Beatles make their first recordings when they back singer Tony Sheridan. Producer Bert Kaempfert lets them record a couple of tunes by themselves.

November 9, 1961: Brian Epstein visits the Cavern Club to hear the group.

December 3, 1961: The Beatles attend their first business meeting with Epstein at his record store.

December 6, 1961: John accepts on behalf of the group, Brian's offer to manage them.

January 1, 1962: Brian Epstein takes the band to an audition at Decca Records. The 15 songs they recorded were later rejected.

January 4, 1962: A music paper called Mersey Beat polled readers about the top band in Liverpool, and the Beatles took highest honours.

April 10, 1962: Stuart Sutcliffe dies of a brain hemorrhage. He was 21.

June 6, 1962: The Beatles audition for George Martin, a producer at EMI. Although his initial reaction was that "they were pretty awful", he signs them and will become their producer throughout their career.

August 15 / 16 1962: At the record company's urging, Pete Best is fired from the Beatles and Ringo Starr is lured away from Rory and The Hurricanes to replace him.

August 23, 1962: John marries Cynthia Powell.

October 5, 1962: Their first single, "Love Me Do" is released and is a modest hit, reaching #17 on the UK chart.

January 19, 1963: The Beatles make their first TV appearance on Thank Your Lucky Stars, where they perform "Please Please Me".

February 11, 1963: In just under ten hours, the band records ten songs for their first album, "Please Please Me".

April 8, 1963: Cynthia Lennon gives birth to John's son, John Charles Julian Lennon.

August 1, 1963: A monthly magazine about the group called The Beatles Book is first published.

August 3, 1963: With their popularity soaring, The Beatles play the Cavern Club for the last time.

September 10, 1963: The Beatles receive an award for Top Vocal Group of the Year at the Variety Club Awards.

November 2, 1963: The Daily Mirror coins the term Beatlemania in a show review.

November 16, 1963: Clark's Grammar School in Guildford, Surrey becomes the first institution to suspend boys for sporting a Beatles haircut.

January 20, 1964: The album "Meet the Beatles!" is released by Capitol Records in the US and by February 15 it is number one on Billboard's chart, remaining there for 11 weeks.

February 7, 1964: The Beatles land at JFK Airport in New York.

February 9, 1964: The Beatles perform on The Ed Sullivan Show and are watched by a record-setting 73 million people. They perform, "All My Loving", "Till There Was You", "She Loves You", "I Saw Her Standing There" and "I Want To Hold Your Hand".

February 11, 1964: The Beatles give their first live performance in the U.S. at the Washington Coliseum in Washington, D.C.

February 12, 1964: The band performs at Carnegie Hall in New York City.

March 2, 1964: They begin to film their first movie. Although the working title was "Beatlemania", the band rejected the name immediately. Paul had suggested "What Little Old Man?", but producers wanted something more distinctive. The name is changed after Ringo makes the off-handed comment, "Its been a hard day's night, that was". Filming is completed in eight weeks at a cost of $500,000.

July 6, 1964: "A Hard Day's Night" premieres in London. The film gets wonderful reviews by fans and critics.

August 11, 1964: "A Hard Day's Night" opens in America.

February 11, 1965: Ringo marries Mary (Maureen) Cox.

February 23, 1965: Shooting begins in the Bahamas on the Beatles' second movie. The original title of the film was "Eight Arms to Hold You", but is later changed to "Help!"

June 12, 1965: The Beatles are named Members of the British Empire by the Queen.

July 29, 1965: The Beatles second feature film, "Help!" opens in London. It opens in the U.S. on August 11 that year. The movie cost $1.5 million to make.

August 15, 1965: The Beatles play for 55,600 people at New York's Shea Stadium, which is a record, grossing $304,000 dollars. (The Beatles' share was $160,000.)

August 27, 1965: The Fab Four meet Elvis Presley at his Beverly Hills home.

September 13, 1965: Ringo and Maureen have a son, Zak Starkey.

January 21, 1966: George marries Patricia Ann (Pattie) Boyd

March, 1966: John Lennon causes a national stir when he is quoted in London's Evening Standard as saying that The Beatles are "more popular than Jesus now". He would later apologise, but by this time, thousands of Beatle records had been smashed by angry fans.

May 1, 1966: The Beatles give their last proper British concert at Empire Pool, Wembley, where they play a 15 minute, 5 song set.

August 6, 1966: John Lennon's remarks about Jesus have caused a giant stir in the US. Brian Epstein holds a press conference in New York to explain.

August 11, 1966: John apologises to the press and tries to explain what his remarks about Jesus really meant.

August 13, 1966: Not satisfied with Lennon's explanation, radio station KLUE in Longview, Texas organizes a "Beatles Bonfire". The next morning, the station's transmission tower is struck by lightning, halting all broadcasting.

August 29, 1966: The Beatles give their last live concert, in San Francisco, California.

June 1, 1967: "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is released in the U.K. It tops the charts all over the world, holding the number one slot in Britain for 27 weeks and for 19 in America. It receives four Grammys including Best Album.

June 25, 1967: Our World, a two-hour satellite television program starring the Beatles was transmitted live by satellite to five continents and 24 countries. They performed "All You Need is Love". It was the first live television satellite program to air worldwide.

August 19, 1967: Ringo and Maureen have a second son, Jason.

August 27, 1967: Brian Epstein dies of an accidental drug overdose.

August 29, 1967: Epstein's family holds a private funeral that the Beatles did not attend.

October, 17, 1967: A memorial service is held for Brian Epstein is held at a synagogue in Abby Road.

December 26, 1967: "Magical Mystery Tour", the Beatles' hour-long television special airs in the U.K., where it is seen by approximately 14 million viewers. The show was panned by critics.

May 14, 1968: John and Paul appear on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, where they publicly denounce their earlier association with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

July 17, 1968: The movie Yellow Submarine premieres in London. It opens in America several months later.

July 20, 1967: Much to Paul's surprise, his girlfriend, Jane Asher announces that their relationship is over.

August 22, 1967: Cynthia Lennon files for divorce from John on the grounds of his adultery with Yoko Ono.

August 23, 1967: Ringo quits the Beatles and walks out during a recording session for "The White Album".

September 3, 1967: Ringo rejoins the group.

January 30, 1969: The Beatles perform together for the last time, live, on the roof of Apple's London office. Later, film of the event will become part of the documentary Let It Be.

March 12, 1969: Paul marries photographer Linda Louise Eastman, a 25 year old divorcee with a six year old daughter. Despite rumours to the contrary, she is not related to the Eastmans of Eastman-Kodak fame.

Mid-September, 1969: John decides to leave the Beatles, but he does not announce it publicly because of contract negotiations taking place with EMI. George and Ringo also have quit the band for short spells, returning soon after.

September 26, 1969: The Beatles last album of original songs, "Abbey Road", is released in the U.K. It tops the charts there and in America.

November 25, 1969: John returns his MBE award.

January 3, 1970: The group's final recording session takes place at EMI's Abby Road studio, where Paul, George and Ringo add some finishing touches to George's song "I, Me, Mine" for the "Let It Be" album.

April 10, 1970: Paul announces publicly that he has left the group and says that they will never work together again.

April 9, 1971: Ringo releases his first single, "It Don't Come Easy".

August 3, 1971: Paul announces the formation of his new group, Wings, with drummer Denny Siewell and former Moody Blues guitarist, Denny Laine.

December 4, 1971: John publicly attacks Paul in the letters section of Melody Maker.

January, 1975: The London High Court officially dissolves The Beatles and Company partnership.

May, 1979: Paul, George and Ringo reunited for a jam session at Eric Clapton's wedding to Pattie Boyd Harrison.

1980, December 8: John Lennon was shot to death in New York City. John had spent the evening recording at the Hit Factory studio, and returned to the Dakota apartments around 11.00 p.m. As he and Yoko stepped from the cab and made their way to the Dakota's entrance, Mark David Chapman came out of the shadows."Mr. Lennon" he said quietly, and Lennon turned. At that instant, Chapman fired five bullets into the rock star, hitting him in the chest, back and left arm. He then calmly put the gun down and took a book out of his coat pocket, sat cross-legged on the sidewalk, and started to read. John was pronounced dead thirty minutes later. Earlier in the day, he had autographed an album for Chapman.




Just hours after being caught on this photograph getting Lennon's autograph,
Mark David Chapman had murdered his so-called idol.
Ringo, who had remained friendly with all the other members of The Beatles throughout the years, was the first to come to comfort Yoko.

August 1981: Mark David Chapman is sentenced to prison for 20 years to life. Over the next few months, Chapman would claim many times to have been beaten by fellow inmates, some of whom allegedly tried to kill him with items like scissors. He also says he had thought about murdering other celebrities, including TV star Johnny Carson.

June 1996: "Free As A Bird" peaks at number 2 on the UK charts and number 6 in the US. Written by John Lennon and performed by him on piano on a rough demo shortly before he was murdered, the track was completed by the remaining Beatles at Paul McCartney's own home studio. The track would win two Grammy Awards in 1997.

Spring 1998: The three surviving Beatles: George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney reunite for the first time in years at a London memorial service for McCartney's wife, Linda, who died on April 17, of breast cancer.

Summer 1998: George Harrison discloses that he had been battling throat cancer for more than a year and had surgery to remove a lump in his neck.

December 30 1999: George Harrison, 56, was hospitalized after being stabbed in the chest by an intruder who broke into his Oxfordshire mansion. Authorities said his condition was not life-threatening.

Harrison and his wife, Olivia, were attacked when an intruder broke into their home about 3:30 a.m. in Henley on Thames, about 25 miles West of London. Harrison received superficial injuries and a one-inch stab wound that was deep enough to penetrate his chest wall but missed any major organs, said Andrew Pengelly, medical director of the Royal Berkshire Hospital.

Harrison was hospitalized at Royal Berkshire Hospital in nearby Reading in stable condition. His wife, who received only superficial injuries, was not admitted to the hospital, but was at Harrison's side, the spokeswoman said. Harrison and his wife struggled with the intruder, believed to be a Liverpool man, and that they apparently were able to detain him until police arrived. The Police said a 33-year-old man was arrested following the incident, and was also being treated for undisclosed injuries, but was then discharged into police custody, authorities said.

The Harrisons lived at Friar Park, a former nunnery close to the center of historic Henley, for more than 20 years. Security at the walled estate is tight, and it was unclear how the intruder managed to enter the house.

In September, 2000: The Recording Industry Association of America announced that, not too surprisingly, The Beatles still enjoy an uncontested lead for all-time album sales by an artist. According to a news release from the RIAA, six Beatles albums gained multiplatinum status in July.

Topping the list is "The Beatles", better known as The White Album, which hit the 18 million mark and is one of the seven highest certified albums of all time.

The album "Love Songs" reached 3 million, "Revolver" shot up to 5 million, "Magical Mystery Tour" is currently certified at 6 million, and both "The Beatles 1962-1966" and "The Beatles 1967-1970" stand at 14 million and 15 million, respectively. These new calculations bring The Beatles' total album sales to a whopping 113.5 million copies.

October 2000 :At his first parole hearing, John Lennon's killer, Mark David Chapman was denied parole.

On November 29th, 2001: George Harrison lost his battle with cancer at the age of 58. He had been flown from a Long Island hospital to receive treatment at the U.C.L.A Medical Center in California. George had reportedly met with surviving band mates Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, to say their final good-byes a few weeks earlier. Harrison passed away at a friend's house, in the company of his wife Olivia Harrison and their 24 year old son Dhani.

June 11, 2002: Paul marries former model, Heather Mills.

October 2002: Mark David Chapman is again denied parole.

October 2004: Chapman's parole application is turned down for the third time.

May 2006: Paul McCartney and his wife Heather Mills McCartney agreed to separate. The couple, who had been married for four years, said they had "with sadness" agreed to split after finding it "increasingly difficult" to maintain a normal relationship in the glare of the public eye.

October 2006: After a 16 minute hearing, 51 year old Mark David Chapman is told by a three member parole board panel that he must remain at Attica Correctional Facility for at least two more years.

December 2006: A 78-minute audio collage of some of The Beatles best work called "Love" debuts at number 4 on the Billboard Hot 200 chart. The album was conceived by former producer George Martin and his son Giles as a stageshow soundtrack to Cirque de Soleil's Las Vegas spectacular of the same name.