Billboard warned that payola—record companies secretly rewarding disc jockeys for airplay—had become so widespread that industry executives could no longer measure its influence. The scandal soon destroyed the career of pioneering rock-and-roll broadcaster Alan Freed.

The Ed Sullivan Show featured Dick Dale performing “Surfin’ and a Swingin’” and the Angels singing “My Boyfriend’s Back.” The varied bill also included Kate Smith, Totie Fields, Stiller and Meara, and the Three Stooges performing their “Maharajah” routine.

The Beatles began recording “Eight Days a Week” at EMI Studios. Paul McCartney later traced the title to a chauffeur who described himself as working eight days a week; issued as an American single in February 1965, the song became the group’s seventh U.S. No. 1.

Apple released George Harrison’s “Something” as the A-side of a Beatles single, the first Harrison composition given that billing. Paired with “Come Together,” it topped the American chart, reached No. 4 in Britain, and made the Top 10 in eight other countries.

Cher led the U.S. singles chart with “Half-Breed,” written for her by Mary Dean, Al Capps, and Snuff Garrett. The record later received Gold certification for one million American sales.

Rick Dees and His Cast of Idiots received a Gold record for “Disco Duck,” which became only the fourth Platinum-certified single that December. WMPS fired Dees after he complained on air that the station would not play his near-No. 1 novelty hit, but a rival hired him and he went on to a Hall of Fame radio career.

Britt Ekland filed a $15 million palimony lawsuit against former partner Rod Stewart. The closely watched dispute never reached trial and ended with an out-of-court property settlement valued at roughly $500,000.

ABBA members Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad married privately in Lidingö, Sweden. The pressures surrounding the group’s extraordinary fame contributed to their separation and divorce three years later.

Atlantic Records chairman Ahmet Ertegun met Jesse Jackson in Chicago over a racially and sexually offensive lyric in the Rolling Stones’ “Some Girls.” Atlantic declined to alter later editions, while Mick Jagger defended the song as a satire of real-world stereotypes rather than an endorsement of them.

Johnny O’Keefe, widely regarded as Australia’s first great rock-and-roll star, died at 43 after an accidental prescription-drug overdose caused a heart attack. From 1959 to 1974 he accumulated 29 Australian Top 40 hits.

Robert John topped the Billboard Hot 100 with “Sad Eyes,” which also reached No. 31 in Britain. The breakthrough came nearly 21 years after his first chart appearance with the minor 1958 hit “White Bucks and Saddle Shoes.”

The Bee Gees sued manager Robert Stigwood for $136 million, alleging fraud and withheld royalties despite his role in their mid-1970s revival. Stigwood countersued for $310 million in defamation; both sides settled privately in May 1981 and exchanged public apologies.

While still a Commodore, Lionel Richie released his self-titled solo debut through Motown. Built with 35 backing performers plus strings, it produced “Truly,” “You Are,” and “My Love,” reached No. 3 on Billboard and No. 1 on Cashbox, and eventually went quadruple Platinum in America and Platinum in Britain.

Elizabeth Taylor married construction worker Larry Fortensky, whom she had met at the Betty Ford Center, during a lavish ceremony financed by Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch. They divorced in 1996 but remained lifelong friends.

The Eagles suspended the final seventeen dates of their Hell Freezes Over reunion tour when Glenn Frey required emergency surgery for diverticulitis. The illness interrupted their first tour in fourteen years, but Frey recovered and the group resumed performing in early 1995.

Mick Jagger donated £100,000—about $150,000—to Dartford Grammar School in Kent, which he had attended as a child. The gift funded instruments and specialist instructors through the Red Rooster project and helped expand the music facilities now associated with the Mick Jagger Centre.

The Four Tops sang the national anthem at Comerica Park before Game 3 of the American League Division Series, wearing jerseys for Detroit’s Tigers, Lions, Pistons, and Red Wings. The hometown Tigers then defeated the New York Yankees 6–0.

The FBI seized a 1976 fingerprint card belonging to John Lennon from a New York memorabilia dealer who planned to auction it with a $100,000 minimum bid. The prints had been taken during Lennon’s permanent-residency application, and investigators believed the card remained government property.

A year after dismissing the possibility, Davy Jones announced a 2011 Monkees reunion. An Evening with the Monkees: The 45th Anniversary Tour reunited Jones, Micky Dolenz, and Peter Tork for their first concerts in a decade and became Jones’s final tour with the group before his death in February 2012.

Readers in a Rolling Stone poll named Starship’s “We Built This City” the worst song of the 1980s. Europe’s “The Final Countdown” and Chris de Burgh’s “The Lady in Red” followed, with Wham!’s “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” and Men Without Hats’ “The Safety Dance” completing the top five.

Pop and country singer Billy Joe Royal died suddenly at 73. His four Billboard Top 40 entries included “Down in the Boondocks,” “I Knew You When,” and “Cherry Hill Park.”

Johnny Cash was inducted posthumously into Nashville’s Music City Walk of Fame. His younger brother Tommy accepted the sidewalk plaque for the singer, who had died in September 2003 at 71.

Cream drummer Ginger Baker died after a short illness at 80. Though Cream lasted only from 1966 to 1968, Baker, Jack Bruce, and Eric Clapton made the landmark albums Fresh Cream, Disraeli Gears, and Wheels of Fire, scored three U.S. Top 40 singles, and entered the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1993.

Eddie Van Halen died from cancer at 65 at a Santa Monica medical center, surrounded by family. His son Wolfgang announced the loss of the guitarist whose two-handed tapping and inventive technique transformed rock guitar playing.

Reggae and pop singer Johnny Nash died from natural causes at 80. He placed six songs in Billboard’s Top 40 between 1958 and 1973, led by the 1972 No. 1 “I Can See Clearly Now.”