January 5 – Former Beatles road manager Mal Evans is shot dead by Los Angeles police after refusing to drop what police only later determine is an air rifle.[1]
January 13 – A trial begins for seven Brunswick Records and Dakar Records employees. The record company employees are charged with stealing more than $184,000 in royalties from artists.
January 19 – Concert promoter Bill Sargent makes an offer of $30 million to the Beatles if they will reunite for a concert.[2]
March 4 – ABBA arrive at Sydney airport for a promotional tour in Australia.[4]
March 6 – EMI Records reissues all 22 previously released British Beatles singles, plus a new single of the classic "Yesterday". All 23 singles hit the UK charts at the same time.
March 26 – In Paris, France, Wings guitarist Jimmy McCulloch breaks one of his fingers when he slips in his hotel bathroom following the final performance on the band's European tour. The injury ended up delaying the band's United States tour by three weeks.
April 24 – Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels makes a semi-serious on-air offer to pay the Beatles $3000 to reunite live on the show. In a 1980 interview, John Lennon stated that he and Paul McCartney happened to be watching the show together at Lennon's apartment in New York and considered walking down to the SNL studio "for a gag" but were "too tired".[5] On May 22, Michaels raises his offer from $3,000 to $3,200.
Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is involved in a car accident northwest of London. Cocaine is found in his wrecked car. Richards is given a court date of January 12, 1977.
Rumour spread by German press: ABBA members killed in plane crash, only Anni-Frid survived.
June 10 – Alice Cooper collapses and is rushed to UCLA Hospital in Los Angeles, three weeks before the Goes To Hell tour would begin. The tour is cancelled.
August 5 – Eric Clapton provokes an uproar over comments he makes on stage at a Birmingham concert, voicing his opposition to immigration using multiple racial slurs while exhorting the audience to support Enoch Powell and to "keep Britain white".
August 11 – Keith Moon is rushed to hospital for the second time in five months, collapsing after trashing his Miami hotel room.[9]
August 13 – The official ABBA logo with the reversed 'B' is adopted.
August 16 – Cliff Richard becomes one of the first Western artists ever to perform in the Soviet Union when he gives a concert in Leningrad.
September 1 – Ode Records president Lou Adler is kidnapped at his Malibu home and released eight hours later after a $25,000 ransom is paid. Two suspects are soon arrested.
The second annual Rock Music Awards air on CBS. Peter Frampton wins Rock Personality of the Year, while Fleetwood Mac wins for Best Group and Best Album.
October 22 - The Damned releases their debut single “New Rose”, considered to be the first release from a British punk group.
October 31 – George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic begin "The P-Funk/Rubber Band Earth Tour" in Houston, a national live series highlighting one of the biggest and revolutionary stage shows in the history of the music industry (the rock group Kiss would be the other group to do a similar act), relying on elaborate costumes, special lighting and effects, and extremely large props including "the Mothership", which would arrive and land on stage, all of what this band is generally known for. This live set would vary in length (on average of 3 to 5 hours long) and at high volume.
Thin Lizzy are forced to cancel their U.S. tour when guitarist Brian Robertson injures his hand in a bar fight.
Jerry Lee Lewis is arrested after showing up drunk outside Graceland at 3 a.m., waving a pistol and loudly demanding to see Elvis Presley. Presley has declined his request.
December 1 – The Sex Pistols appear on Thames Television's Today show as a last-minute replacement for Queen. The group causes a national outcry after swearing on the show.
A Pink Floyd album cover shoot in South London goes awry when a large inflatable pig balloon being used for the shoot breaks free of its moorings and drifts out of sight.
The Eagles release Hotel California. Globally, it will become the third best-selling album of all time, behind the same band's February-released Greatest Hits compilation.
"TOP RECORDS OF 1975 (from Billboard)
The information compiled for the top records survey is based on the weekly chart positioning and length of time records were on the respective charts from the
issue dates of November 8, 1975 through October 30, 1976. These recaps, as well as the weekly charts, do not reflect actual sales figures. The ratings take into account the number of weeks the disk was on the chart, plus the weekly positions it held during its chart life. Each disk was given points accordingly for its respective chart, and in addition, the number one disk each week was assigned bonus points equal to the total number of positions on its respective charts."[20]
Unfortunately, Billboard's late December print deadline prevented approximately 60 records from completing their full chart runs, and includes data of approximately 50 records from 1976, some of which have enough points to rank in the current years chart. In contrast with the Billboard Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1976, the chart below does not truncate or split chart runs between years. It does not add two months from 1975, delete two months from 1976 and then call itself the "Year-End Hot 100 singles of 1976", which it is obviously not. Joel Whitburn's Records Research books, archived issues of Billboard for November-December 1975 and December 1976-March 1976, and Hot 100 Year-End formulas were used to complete the year-end chart reprinted here.
The completed Billboard year-end list for 1976 is composed of records that entered the Billboard Hot 100 between November 1975 and December 1976. Records with chart runs that started in 1975 and ended in 1976, or started in 1976 and ended in 1976, made this chart if the majority of their chart weeks were in 1976. If not, they were ranked in the year-end charts for 1975 or 1976. If their weeks were equal, they were listed in the year they first entered. Appearing in multiple years is not permitted. Each week thirty points were awarded to the number one record, then nineteen points for number two, eighteen points for number three, and so on. The total points a record earned determined its year-end rank. The complete chart life of each record is represented, with number of points accrued. There are no ties, even when multiple records have the same number of points. The next ranking category is peak chart position, then weeks at peak chart position, weeks on Hot 100 chart, weeks in top forty, and finally weeks in top ten. All chart rankings represented below for the Top Soul Singles, Top Country Singles, Top Easy Listening Singles, and Top CashBox pop singles were all calculated in the same manner.
The chart can be sorted by Artist, Song title, Recording and Release dates, Cashbox year-end ranking (CB) or units sold (sales) by clicking on the column header. Additional details for each record can be accessed by clicking on the song title, and referring to the Infobox in the right column of the song page. Billboard also has chart summaries on its website. Sales information was derived from the RIAA's Gold and Platinum database, the BRIT Certified database and The Book of Golden Discs,[21] but numbers listed should be regarded as estimates. Grammy Hall of Fame and National Recording Registry information with sources can be found on Wikipedia.
US Billboard 1976 #3, Hot100 #1 for 3 weeks, 25 total weeks, 216 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #13, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 20 total weeks, 181 points
US Billboard 1976 #4, Hot100 #1 for 1 week, 19 total weeks, 205 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #7, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 13 total weeks, 172 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #7, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 13 total weeks, 172 points, Grammy Hall of Fame 2000
US Billboard 1976 #5, Hot100 #1 for 4 weeks, 20 total weeks, 195 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #11, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 1 week, 13 total weeks, 167 points, Grammy Hall of Fame 2017
US Billboard 1976 #9, Hot100 #1 for 2 weeks, 26 total weeks, 186 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #5, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 1 weeks, 26 total weeks, 229 points
US Billboard 1976 #10, Hot100 #1 for 1 week, 21 total weeks, 186 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #3, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 4 weeks, 18 total weeks, 268 points, Grammy Hall of Fame 2004
US Billboard 1976 #11, Hot100 #1 for 4 weeks, 19 total weeks, 185 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #2, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 6 weeks, 21 total weeks, 299 points
US Billboard 1976 #12, Hot100 #1 for 2 weeks, 21 total weeks, 180 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #6, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 1 week, 18 total weeks, 185 points
US Billboard 1976 #13, Hot100 #2 for 2 weeks, 24 total weeks, 173 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #5, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 1 week, 16 total weeks, 187 points, Grammy Hall of Fame 2017
US Billboard 1976 #16, Hot100 #2 for 2 weeks, 17 total weeks, 170 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #9, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 22 total weeks, 212 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #10, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 1 week, 14 total weeks, 167 points
US Billboard 1976 #20, Hot100 #1 for 3 weeks, 17 total weeks, 167 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #12, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 14 total weeks, 161 points, Grammy Hall of Fame 2011
US Billboard 1976 #21, Hot100 #1 for 1 week, 23 total weeks, 167 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #6, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 22 total weeks, 223 points
US Billboard 1976 #22, Hot100 #1 for 1 week, 16 total weeks, 166 points, Top Country Singles 1976 #1, Country Singles #1 for 6 weeks, 15 total weeks, 225 points
US Billboard 1976 #37, Hot100 #3 for 2 week, 21 total weeks, 142 points, Top Soul Singles 1976 #1, Hot Soul Singles #1 for 4 weeks, 23 total weeks, 223 points
US Billboard 1976 #63, Hot100 #8 for 1 weeks, 19 total weeks, 88 points, Top Easy Listening Singles 1976 #1, Easy Listening Singles #1 for 2 weeks, 26 total weeks, 304 points
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