Pick a Day

11 DECEMBER

In Music History

2023 Taylor Swift's Eras tour becomes the first to gross over $1 billion, hitting the mark in the first 60 shows, according to Pollstar's report. The previous record holder was Elton John's Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour, which took in $939 million in 328 shows from 2018-2023.

2015 Peter Garrett, frontman for the incendiary Aussie rock band Midnight Oil, publishes his memoir, Big Blue Sky.

2014 Country singer Dawn Sears (of The Time Jumpers) dies of lung cancer at age 53. She was a member of Vince Gill's road band and sang harmony on his 1992 album, I Still Believe In You.

2013 Tommy Ruger (drummer for The Nightcrawlers) dies of multiple health issues, including diabetes, in Port Orange, Florida, at age 67.

2012 Sitar maestro Ravi Shankar dies during surgery for a heart valve replacement in San Diego, California, at age 92. He was survived by two daughters, Norah Jones and Anoushka Shankar. His son, musician Shubhendra Shankar, died in 1992.

2010 Good Charlotte's Joel Madden marries Nicole Richie at the home of Richie's dad, Lionel Richie, in Los Angeles.

2006 "All I Want For Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey becomes the first ringtone certified Gold for sales of over 500,000.

1998 Lynn Strait (lead singer for Snot) dies in a car accident in Santa Barbara, California, at age 30.

1996 Hailee Steinfeld is born in Los Angeles. She starts as an actress, with a breakout role at 13 in the 2010 movie True Grit. In 2015 she moves into music with her debut single, "Love Myself." She has hits with "Starving" in 2016 and "Most Girls" in 2017, but her acting outpaces her music as she lands roles in Bumblebee, The Marvels and the Spider-Man: Spider-Verse franchise.

1990 Led Zeppelin IV is certified Diamond, with sales of 10 million in America.

1989 Supporting Alice Cooper, Great White play Wembley Arena; the concert is broadcast later by The Friday Rock Show and is released the following year in Japan as Live In London.

1988 Los Angeles' Wiltern Theatre plays host to a Roy Orbison tribute concert, featuring Don Henley, Tom Petty, Graham Nash and Bonnie Raitt.

1983 Run-D.M.C. release their second single, "Hard Times," a song about financial struggles. It's the first rap song to get covered by another rap group, having first appeared on Kurtis Blow's debut album in 1980.

1983 Whodini release their debut album, one of the first rap LPs on a major label (Jive). The song "Magic's Wand" inspires their name, which is a play on the name of magician Harry Houdini.

1981 Bad Brains play the last-ever show at Max's Kansas City, a storied New York City nightclub where The Velvet Underground, David Bowie, and The New York Dolls all played early in their careers. Their opening act is a group of teenagers from Brooklyn called The Beastie Boys.