May 31st

May 31st

2005 “Rock School” soundtrack is released.

Get an ‘A’ for attitude. Billy Idol, Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine and Alice Cooper are heard on the soundtrack. The documentary is about the Philadelphia music school for children who want to learn to Rock.

2014 Queen’s musical, “We Will Rock You” closes in London.

There were 4,600 performances for more than 6.5 million people during the 12-year run at the Dominion Theatre.

2022 “Pistol” debuts.  

The mini-series is based on guitarist Steve Jones memoir, “Lonely Boy,” chronicling his experiences in the Sex Pistols, the notorious Punk band.

Linkin Park’s “Up From The Bottom” owns two Billboard charts.

The song is #1 on Billboard‘s Alternative Airplay and Mainstream Rock Airplay charts.

MORE TODAY IN ROCK…

1948 Led Zeppelin’s unique and powerful drummer, the legendary John Bonham, enters the world. In early Zeppelin promotional materials he is tagged as the “champion beer drinker in England.”

1961 Jimi Hendrix signs up for a three-year Army hitch. It’s either that or jail time (for riding in a stolen car).

1976 The Who earn the title “the loudest Rock band ever.” Their concert at the Charlton Athletic Grounds in England hits 120 decibels according to the Guinness Book of World Records. Any wonder guitarist Pete Townshend constantly complains of hearing loss?

1979 Supertramp play Madison Square Garden. While on stage they are awarded a platinum album for “Breakfast In America.”

1980 Fall Out Boy drummer Andy Hurley has a birthday. 

1989 The first International Rock Awards are held in New York. Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards picks up the Living Legend honor while Eric Clapton takes the trophy for Best Guitarist.

1993 Alan McGhee, head of Creation Records, sees Oasis perform in Glasgow. Thinking he’s found a cross between the Sex Pistols and The Beatles, he signs the group.

1999 Stevie Wonder receives the Polar Music Prize in Stockholm.

2007 Frontman Perry Farrell puts the blame for the demise of Jane’s Addiction squarely on guitarist Dave Navarro’s freelancing (first he claims it was Navarro’s participation in the Rock Star reality series – and subsequent tour – then later says it was MTV’s “‘Til Death Do Us Part: Carmen & Dave” with Navarro and then wife, Carmen Electra). Navarro responds, essentially saying Farrell doesn’t have a clue. The bickering, via online posts, takes up the better part of the month.

2008 Ex-Talking Heads frontman David Byrne transforms Battery Maritime Building in New York into a musical instrument by attaching devices that cause beams and pipes in the structure to vibrate and produce sound. It’s an 11-day exhibition.

2012 Alice In Chains co-founder Jerry Cantrell is given the Stevie Ray Vaughan Award at the eighth annual MusiCares MAP Fund benefit concert at Club Nokia in L.A. The honor is for the guitarist’s dedication and support of the MusiCares MAP Fund, and for his commitment to helping other addicts with the addiction and recovery process.

2013 Scott Weiland files a countersuit against his former band Stone Temple Pilots. He seeks in excess of $7 million in damages for what he believes was a conspiracy to oust him. In the documents Weiland asks, “How do you expel a man from the band that he started, named, sang lead on every song, wrote the lyrics, and was the face of for twenty years? You don’t, but three of the instrumentalists from the band Stone Temple Pilots tried.”

2015 Members of Mastodon appear in an episode of the cable TV series “Game Of Thrones,” playing a group of wildings who are brutally murdered before getting resurrected by White Walkers.

2022 Europe’s music video for their ’86 hit “The Final Countdown” surpasses one billion YouTube views. The clip, uploaded in ‘09, contains concert and soundcheck footage. 

2023 Failed Arizona GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake has Lenny Kravitz’s rendition of “American Woman” (a cover of the Guess Who’s ’70 derogatory take on the U.S.) playing as she enters a rally in Scottsdale to announce yet another legal challenge to the results of the ’22 election which she lost but refused to concede. Lake gets beat up on social media for obvious reasons. 

2025 Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler’s stage-played “Dream On” keyboard sells for $130,000 during the “Music Icons” auction at the Hard Rock Cafe in NYC’s Times Square. Nearly 700 items were on the Julien’s Auctions block during the two-day event.