This Day in Rock History: December 16

Breakthrough Hits and Milestones

• 1966: The Jimi Hendrix Experience released their first single in the U.K., "Hey Joe." It only peaked at No. 6 on the charts, but it still generated buzz throughout the music world and has become a rock standard covered by hundreds of artists.
• 1989: Billy Joel's 11th studio album, Storm Front, reached the top spot of the Billboard 200 album chart. It featured the hit "We Didn't Start the Fire," a fast-paced song cataloguing historical moments and trends from Joel's birth year of 1949 up to the present day. Storm Front was Joel's third No. 1 album in the United States.
• 1993: MTV broadcast Nirvana's Unplugged session for the first time. It was recorded a few weeks earlier, on Nov. 18, and was released as an album a year later. Today, it has sold an estimated 16 million copies worldwide.

Cultural Milestones

• 1949: ZZ Top co-founder, lead guitarist, and main vocalist Billy F. Gibbons was born in Houston, Texas. He first made a name for himself as a member of the psychedelic rock band Moving Sidewalks, which opened for the Jimi Hendrix Experience on their first headlining U.S. tour. Gibbons formed ZZ Top in 1969 alongside Dusty Hill and Frank Beard.
• 1974: Rolling Stones' guitarist Mick Taylor officially announced that he was leaving the band, after privately letting his band members know four days earlier. Ronnie Wood took his place and is still with the band today. Taylor went on to have a successful career as a solo artist and session musician.
• 1983: Guitarist Pete Townshend announced he was leaving The Who, although he would later return for Live Aid in 1985 and a full reunion tour in 1989. He cited both professional and personal reasons. They had lost drummer Keith Moon a few years prior, and Townshend had also grown weary of the constant touring.