ON THIS DAY
May 20, 2017
MAY 20, 1965
THE Kinks pop group stopped their own show last night — with a fight on stage at the Capitol Cinema, Cardiff, before 2,500 screaming teenagers. The row was between Dave Davies, 18, guitarist, and drummer Mick Avory, 20. Davies kicked out at the drums, then Avory hit Davies on the head with a microphone. Road manager Mr Sam Curtis, said: ‘I think the group must break up now.’ [It actually broke up in 1996.]
MAY 20, 1967
THE BBC has banned a song from The Beatles’ LP, Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. A Day In The Life, written by John Lennon, refers to ‘having a smoke’ and going off in a ‘dream’. An official said it ‘could encourage a permissive attitude to drug-taking’.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
EARL SPENCER, 53. Princess Diana’s younger brother was christened in Westminster Abbey, with the Queen as his godmother. As a child, he referred to his less studious sister as ‘Brian’ — after the dim-witted snail in The Magic Roundabout. He also had a nickname for his stepmother, Raine Spencer: ‘Acid Raine’.
LOUIS THEROUX, 47. The BBC television documentary maker has admitted he became friendly with disgraced DJ Jimmy Savile after he interviewed him in 2000 yet had no idea about his monstrous behaviour as a sexual predator. When interviewing u.S. wrestlers for another show, he asked them if wrestling was fake. In retaliation, they got him to join them for a training session — and Theroux threw up.
BORN ON THIS DAY
JOE COCKER (1944-2014). The Sheffield-born singer (right) and former gas fitter was best known for a cover of The Beatles’ With A Little Help From My Friends. His rasping voice was honed by a bottle of bourbon and 80 cigarettes a day. When, in a haze of drugs and alcohol he met Princess Anne in a nightclub, he confused her for his girlfriend and police had to intervene.
JOHN STUART MILL (1806-1873). An influential 19th-century philosopher, the political economist began learning Greek aged three. He was an advocate of utilitarianism — maximising the wellbeing of the greatest number of people. As MP for Westminster, he supported equality for women and was once arrested for distributing pamphlets promoting birth control.