Category Archives: Anniversaries

by - 0 comments

This week in Joan Jett history: October 3, 1988

From the blackheart.com newsletter:

The week of October 3, 1988, “I Hate Myself for Loving You” cracked the Top 10, landing at #8 on Billboard’s Hot 100.

According to billboard.com– if I’ve interpreted it right–the song debuted at its peak position, #8, on October 1, 1988, and spent 26 weeks on the chart. 😀

Watch on YouTube

Check out billboard.com for all of Joan’s Billboard chart history:

http://www.billboard.com/artist/joan-jett/chart-history/4936#/artist/joan-jett/chart-history/4936

Sign up for the Blackheart Records newsletter HERE.

by - 4 Comments

I Love Rock-n-Roll turns 30 this year! (Gibson.com)

Gibson.com just reminded me that I Love Rock-n-Roll turns 30 this year, because, technically, the album was released in 1981. I need to sit down. Hold on a sec.

*passes out* … *comes to*

Whew, OK. In a feature released today (“Joan Jett: 30 Years of Rock and Roll”), Gibson.com celebrates the 30th anniversary of ILRNR, and the Gibson Melody Maker guitar that brought this iconic album to life. Here’s a snippet:

To get a close-up look at how Jett and her scalding tone are wired, check out the album that elevated her from the club scene to arena and festival stages, I Love Rock ’n’ Roll, which was released 30 years ago but still smells like a fresh power-pop bouquet.

The disc featured the twin six-string attack of Jett and Ricky Byrd, although it’s Jett’s raging rhythms that drive the entire affair. Jett is known for using a Mesa-Boogie Mark III head with Marshall or Mesa cabinets as well as a Vox AC-30 in tandem, but, according to her current guitar foil Dougie Needles, she used a MusicMan 2×12 combo for her power playing on the album’s title track, turned up to “stun.”

Jett’s grounding in punk rock and her scholarly knowledge of ’60s garage rock and pop created the album’s overall blend of punk-inspired heat balanced by concision and mainstream accessibility.
…
The Arrows weren’t the only group from the past that Jett tapped for material. As the crafty hooks, classic pop length and focus on melody at the core of her own writing indicate, she is a student of great ’50s and ’60s pop-rock. So the I Love Rock ’n’ Roll album also features tunes originally cut by Tommy James and the Shondells (“Crimson and Clover”), the Dave Clark Five (“Bits and Pieces”), the Kingsmen (“Louie Louie”), Eddie Cochran (“Summertime Blues”) and the Coasters (“Nag”). That the album’s original songs like “Love Is Pain” and “Be Straight” hold up to the chestnuts Jett covered is tribute to how well she absorbed the lessons of the past.

When it comes to guitar playing, Jett’s mantra remains “keep it simple, but effective.” Few artists have gotten, or continue to get, as much mileage out of down-stroked trimmed-to-the-core rhythm guitar as she does. Today Jett’s discography includes 14 studio albums, including 1995’s Evil Stig backed by the Gits, and half as many compilation discs.

Read the rest here: http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Features/joan-jett-0127-2011/

Read more about the history of I Love Rock-n-Roll HERE. The album was released just before Christmas in 1981, so we have all year to plan the celebration! 😀

by - 5 Comments

Happy Anniversary “Born to be Jetthead”!

Today my baby turns ONE! YAY!!

To celebrate, and to thank you all for your love, support, and encouragement all year, I have redesigned the site and added some features that I think you’ll enjoy. I hope you like it.

1. The most obvious change is, of course, the new layout. I found one at WordPress.com that allows me to rearrange my sidebars at will, and it gives me more areas for widgets, including four footer sections, where I have moved all the boring crap like searching, archives, disclaimers, and such. And if I get tired of the dark background, I can switch to a light one anytime. It’s a good theme if you like to tinker.

2. New feature: JETTHEAD CALENDAR. In my new sidebar area, I have included a feed to my Google calendar,  in which I have started to add  all kinds of Jetthead-related dates, like upcoming concerts, birthdays, anniversaries, and anything else important to my OCD mind Jettheads. It will only show current and future dates. Click on any calendar entry  to view more information about it.

3. The Runaways Concert Archive has been updated (finally!) with dates from 1976-1978, courtesy of our good buddy Mikey (@jettrocker). I will update The Blackhearts’ concert archive with more dates soon. I need to redesign the navigation first. It sucks.

4. I have updated all of my static pages — About, Glossary, and Concert Archive — with their own custom header graphics, added some new pictures, and changed the layouts to full-width without sidebars.

This year has been phenomenal, because of you. Running this site is a lot of work, but I am having a lot of fun!

I will have more anniversary goodies for you throughout the week.

Thank you so much!!

by - 0 comments

11/15/2000: The Rocky Horror Show Opens on Broadway

(I have to apologize for not posting this on 11/15, but I’m running a few days behind.) Playbill.com’s “Today in Theater History” feature from 11/15 remembers the Broadway opening of The Rocky Horror Show starring Joan Jett as Columbia.

2000 The Rocky Horror Show, Richard O’Brien’s camp science-fiction/horror/musical, gets a Broadway revival starring Daphne Rubin-Vega, Lea DeLaria, Alice Ripley, rock star Joan Jett, and, as the Narrator, onetime talk show host Dick Cavett. It runs 437 performances at the Circle in the Square Theatre. The British import was a 45-performance flop in its original 1975 production, but a movie adaptation, The Rocky Horror Picture Show attracted a devoted cult. In accord with that, audiences for the Broadway revival are issued sacks with newspapers (to use as rain hats) and rice (to throw in the wedding scene), along with other wacky interactive goodies.

Click HERE to read what else happened on 11/15 in theater history on playbill.com.

Here’s an nyrock.com review of the play from January 2001:

Notable in the cast is Joan Jett as the coquette Columbia, the part that in the Rocky Horror movie made a star of Little Nell who tap danced her way into 15+ minutes of fame that she later parlayed into a successful nightclub bearing her name. Obviously Jett wouldn’t be caught dead doing anything as girlish as tap dance, so she’s allowed to play her guitar instead, which adds an extra degree of rock ‘n’ roll authenticity to a show that even John Waters would call a little “campy.”

Source

And here’s Joan performing the “Time Warp” with the cast on The Rosie O’Donnell show on Wednesday, November 1st, 2000. (Newbie hint: Joan is the bald one.)

Source

by - 0 comments

We miss you, Sandy West (7/10/1959 – 10/21/2006)

My thoughts and prayers are with Sandy West’s friends and family today, just in case they need them. Let’s celebrate her life and music with some videos:

Neon Angels on the Road to Ruin – check out that drum solo!

Source

See more after the jump. Continue reading →

by - 1 Comment

Anniversary: Long Island Music Hall of Fame, 10/15/2006

Three years ago today, Joan became the first-ever inductee into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame. Happy Anniversary, Joan!

I remember hearing Joan’s entire speech somewhere on the web right after the induction happened. I can’t find it now. Does anyone know if it’s still out there? I remember that her speech was really sweet and I’d love to hear it again.

I did manage to find some video footage of the event that I haven’t seen before. Enjoy!

Joan interview at 5:03:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about “Long Island Music Hall of Fame“, posted with vodpod

Now if only the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland could get its head out of its ass long enough to induct The Runaways and Joan’s solo work. I can only hope it happens before the sun supernovas.