American country music singer, songwriter and musician as well as a film actor. He is known for such hits as “Me and Bobby McGee”, “For the Good Times”, “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down”, and “Help Me Make It Through the Night”. Kristofferson is the sole writer of most of his songs, and he has collaborated with various other figures of the Nashville scene such as Shel Silverstein. In 1985, Kristofferson joined fellow country artists Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash in forming the country music supergroup “The Highwaymen”. In 2004 Kristofferson was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
A Ghost Is Born is the fifth studio album by Chicago-based alternative rock band Wilco. Released on June 22, 2004, it features singer Jeff Tweedy on lead guitar more than any previous Wilco album. The band streamed the album online for free, and offered a five song EP to purchasers.
Blue (1971) is the fourth album of Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Exploring the various facets of relationships from infatuation on “A Case of You” to insecurity on “This Flight Tonight”, the songs feature simple accompaniments on piano, guitar, and Appalachian dulcimer. Blue was a critical and commercial success, reaching #15 on the Billboard 200 and #3 in the UK Albums Chart. The single “Carey” reached #93 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. In January 2000, the New York Times chose Blue as one of the 25 albums that represented “turning points and pinnacles in 20th-century popular music”. It was released June 22 in 1971
Cynthia Ann Stephanie “Cyndi” Lauper (born June 22, 1953) American singer-songwriter, actress whose career has spanned over four decades. Her debut solo album She’s So Unusual (1983) was an instant commercial success. The album was the first debut female album to chart four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—”Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” “Time After Time,” “She Bop,” and “All Through the Night,” earning Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Grammy Awards in 1985.
Todd Harry Rundgren (born June 22, 1948) American multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and record producer. Hailed in the early stage of his career as a new pop star, supported by the certified gold solo double LP Something/Anything? in 1972,his career has produced a diverse range of recordings, both as a solo artist and as a member of the band Utopia. He has also been prolific as a producer and engineer on the recorded work of other musicians.
Ray Davies’s (born 21 June 1944)influence on british music is large and important. It really became visible during the brit-pop period, but I can hear his way of talking about the english way of live in today’s pop and rap/hip-hop also. They might not know why they do it the way the do, but we do, it is the way Ray Davies taught them through his songs.
John Lee Hooker (August 22, 1917 – June 21, 2001) was a highly influential American blues singer, songwriter and guitarist. Hooker was born in Mississippi, he was the son of a sharecropper, and rose to prominence performing his own interpretation of what was originally a unique style of country blues. He developed a ‘talking blues‘ style that became his trademark. Though similar to the early Delta blues, his music was metrically free. John Lee Hooker could be said to embody his own genre of the blues, often incorporating the boogie-woogie piano style and a driving rhythm into his blues guitar playing and singing. His best known songs include Boogie Chillen’ (1948), I’m in the Mood (1951), and Boom Boom(1962)—the first two reaching #1 on the Billboard R&B chart.
Nils Hilmer Lofgren (born June 21, 1951, Chicago, Illinois, United States) is an American rock musician, recording artist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Along with his work as a solo artist, he has marked over 25 yearsas a member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band as well as a former member of Crazy Horse and Grin.
“The record chronicles the post-hippie, post-Vietnam demise of counterculture idealism, and a generation’s long, slow trickle down the drain through drugs, violence, and twisted sexuality. This is Young’s only conceptually cohesive record, and it’s a great one.”
~Dave Marsh (The New Rolling Stone Record Guide)
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“Tonight’s the Night is that one rare record I will never tire of.”
~Chris Fallon (PopMatters)
Brian Douglas Wilson (born June 20, 1942) is an American musician and the leader, lead vocalist, bassist and chief songwriter of the Beach Boys. Besides being their primary composer, he also functioned as the band’s main producer and arranger. After signing with Capitol Records in mid-1962, Wilson wrote or co-wrote more than two dozen Top 40 hits for the Beach Boys.
Eric Allan Dolphy, Jr. (June 20, 1928 – June 29, 1964) was an American jazz alto saxophonist, flutist, and bass clarinetist. On a few occasions, he also played the clarinet, piccolo, and baritone saxophone. Dolphy was one of several multi-instrumentalists to gain prominence in the 1960s. He was also the first important bass clarinet soloist in jazz, and among the earliest significant flute soloists.
Chester Burton “Chet” Atkins (June 20, 1924 – June 30, 2001) was an American guitarist and record producer who, along with Owen Bradley, created the smoother country music style known as the Nashville sound, which expanded country’s appeal to adult pop music fans as well.
De Stijl is the second studio album by the American garage rock band The White Stripes, released on June 20, 2000 on Sympathy for the Record Industry. The album reached number thirty-eight on Billboard’s Independent Albums chart in 2002, when The White Stripes’ popularity began to grow. It has since become a cult favorite among White Stripes fans, due to the simplicity of the band’s blues/punk fusion.
A singular talent who passed almost unnoticed during his brief lifetime, Nick Drake produced several albums of chilling, somber beauty. With hindsight, these have come to be recognized as peak achievements of both the British folk-rock scene and the entire rock singer/songwriter genre.
~Richie Unterberger (allmusic.com)
Robert Franklin Palmer Jr. (June 19, 1945 – November 20, 1997) was a 20th century American writer, musicologist, clarinetist, saxophonist, and blues producer. Robert Palmer is best known for books he authored such as Deep Blues , his music journalism articles for The New York Times and Rolling Stone magazine, his work producing blues recordings and the soundtrack to the film Deep Blues, and his clarinet work in the 1960s band The Insect Trust. A collection of his work, titled Blues & Chaos: The Music Writing of Robert Palmer and edited by Anthony DeCurtis, was published by Scribner on November 10, 2009.
Ann Dustin Wilson (born June 19, 1950) is an American musician, best known as the lead singer, flute player, songwriter, and occasional guitar player of the rock band Heart.
“I think people who create and write, it actually does flow – just flows from into their head, into their hand, and they right it down. It’s simple.”
― Paul McCartney
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“What I have to say is all in the music. If I want to say anything, I write a song.”
― Paul McCartney
Clarence Anicholas Clemons, Jr. (January 11, 1942 – June 18, 2011), also known as The Big Man, was an American musician and actor. From 1972 until his death, he was a prominent member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, playing the tenor saxophone.
Jackie Leven (18 June 1950 – 14 November 2011) was a Scottishsongwriter and folkmusician. After starting his career as a folk musician in the late 1960s, he first found success with new wave band Doll by Doll. He later recorded as a solo artist, releasing more than twenty albums under his own name or under the pseudonym Sir Vincent Lone.
Alison Moyet (born Geneviève Alison Jane Moyet 18 June 1961, Billericay) is an English singer, songwriter and performer noted for her bluesy voice.Her UK album sales have reached a certified 2.3 million, with over a million singles sold, All seven of her studio albums and three compilation albums have charted in the Top 30 UK Album Chart, with two of the albums reaching number one. She has also achieved nine Top 30 singles and five Top 10 hits in the UK Singles Chart.
Odelay is the fifth studio album by American alternative rock artist Beck, originally released on June 18, 1996, by DGC Records.Odelay featured several singles, including “Where It’s At”, “Devils Haircut”, and “The New Pollution”. The album peaked at #16 on the Billboard 200 chart and eventually sold over 2 million copies in the United States. It was also Beck’s first hit album in the United Kingdom, making #17; it has since gone platinum in the UK.
