Coming up: the next music anniversaries on Past Tunes’ calendar. Each entry gives the date, the year, and why it still matters. Where a full story already exists on this site, it is linked.
October 31, 1975 — Queen releases “Bohemian Rhapsody.” A six-minute single that radio said was too long becomes one of the most famous records ever made, spending nine weeks at number one in the United Kingdom. Our full On This Day story publishes on October 31.
November 1, 1980 — Bruce Springsteen’s The River debuts at number four in the United States; a week later, on the November 8 Billboard chart, it reaches number one, his first American number-one album, a double record that pairs big choruses with small, plainspoken stories.
November 8, 1971 — Led Zeppelin releases their untitled fourth album, known ever since as Led Zeppelin IV. Issued with no band name and no title on the cover, it carries “Stairway to Heaven” and becomes one of the best-selling albums of all time.
November 8, 1975 — Elton John debuts at number one on the American album chart with Rock of the Westies, where it stays for three weeks. It is his tenth studio album and his seventh American chart-topper, carried by the number-one single “Island Girl.”
November 29, 1982 — Michael Jackson releases Thriller. It goes on to become the best-selling album in history, built on “Billie Jean” and “Beat It.”
November 30, 1979 — Pink Floyd releases The Wall in the United Kingdom. A double album about isolation, it tops the American charts for fifteen weeks and becomes one of the defining rock records of its era.
Dates here follow chart records and artist archives as reported in published music histories. Full stories on this site name their sources in the article.