On this day December 9 in Rock history:

1961 -   The Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" tops the Cashbox Magazine Best Sellers Chart for the first of a four week run. The disc would later be awarded a Gold Record by the RIAA for selling over one million copies.

1962 -   The Four Seasons sing their current US number one hit, "Big Girls Don't Cry" on The Ed Sullivan Show. The song also reached the top of the R&B chart and climbed to #13 in the UK. It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2015.

Capitol Records releases The Beach Boys' "Little Saint Nick". The song would reach #57 in the UK, #29 on the Hot 100, and #22 on Billboard's Holiday 100. The song's writer is shown as Brian Wilson on the original single, but after a lawsuit in 1990, Mike Love was listed as a co-writer.

1963 -   The first Supremes album, "Meet The Supremes" is released by Motown Records. The LP includes the group's earliest singles: "I Want a Guy" (did not chart), "Buttered Popcorn" (did not chart), "Your Heart Belongs to Me" (US #95) and "Let Me Go the Right Way" (US #90).

1965 -   A group of studio musicians known as The Wrecking Crew records "No Matter What Shape (Your Stomachs in)" at United Artists Studios in Hollywood. Credited to The T-Bones, the record would become a hit, reaching #3 on the Hot 100, and Liberty needed group to appear on record covers, TV, and in concert. The "public" T-Bones were Judd Hamilton, Dan Hamilton, Joe Frank Carollo, Tommy Reynolds, and Gene Pello. None of them played on the hit record, but they would later achieve fame as Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds.

1967 -   Jim Morrison is arrested onstage in New Haven, Connecticut. Before the gig, Morrison got into an argument with a policeman, who responded by macing the singer. During the concert, while singing "Back Door Man", Morrison told the audience about the incident, which prompted police to turn on the house lights and arrest Morrison for breach of peace and resisting arrest.

1972 -   Helen Reddy became Australia's first female artist to have a number one record on the US chart when "I Am Woman" reached the top of the Billboard hit parade. Surprisingly, the song didn't chart at all in the UK. Although the Women's Liberation Movement would adopt the song as their unofficial anthem, many ignored the fact that the music was written by a man, Ray Burton. Reddy would achieve two more US number one singles over the next couple of years with "Delta Dawn" and "Angie Baby".

The Moody Blues hit number one on the US album charts for the first time with "Seventh Sojourn". It will be their last album of new material for more than five years as the group's members split to record and to tour as solo artists.

Elton John's "Crocodile Rock" enters the Billboard Hot 100 at #73. It would become his fourth US Top Ten hit and first number one single, rising to the top spot on February 3rd, 1973. The Recording Industry Association of America would award Elton and lyricist Bernie Taupin a Platinum disc for their effort in September 1995.

Three Dog Night's "Pieces of April" enters the Billboard Top 40 at #33. The Dave Loggins written ballad will top out at #19, giving the band their fifteenth Top 20 hit.

1974 -   Apple Records releases George Harrison's fifth studio album, "Dark Horse". Several of the songs focus on his recent split with his wife, Pattie Boyd. Although the LP did not produce any major hit singles, it still managed to reach #4 on the Billboard 200. Unfortunately, it also became Harrison's first solo album not to chart in Britain.

1978 -   John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd release their version of Sam And Dave's "Soul Man" under the name The Blues Brothers. Belushi and Ackroyd would reach #14 in the US, while the original had topped out at #2.

Gino Vannelli enjoys his highest charting Billboard single when "I Just Wanna Stop" peaks at #4. It would top the charts in his native Canada and be nominated for a Grammy Award next spring.

Chic's Disco / Funk tune "Le Freak" tops the Billboard Hot 100 for the first of four weeks. The record would reach the Top Ten in twelve other countries, selling more than seven million copies world-wide.

Village People broke into the UK Official Chart's Top 40 with "Y.M.C.A.", a single that would climb to #1 on January 1st of the following year and remain there for three weeks. The song also reached the top spot in thirteen other countries and became one of fewer than forty singles to sell ten million or more physical copies worldwide. In the United States it peaked at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #3 on the Cashbox Best Sellers chart.

1980 -   The day after John Lennon was murdered, Yoko Ono issued a statement to the press that read: "There is no funeral for John. John loved and prayed for the human race. Please do the same for him. Love, Yoko and Sean." She also pleaded with chanting and singing mourners outside The Dakota to re-convene in Central Park the following Sunday for ten minutes of silent prayer. Meanwhile, Paul went into a recording studio to clear his head. He reportedly told his guitarist, Denny Laine, "I'm never gonna fall out with anybody again, just in case this happens."

1981 -   Sonny Til, the lead singer of the '50s Doo Wop group, The Orioles, died of a heart attack at the age of 56. The group topped the Billboard R&B chart in 1953 with their million selling version of "Crying In The Chapel".

1984 -   Michael Jackson announces that at the end of the current Jackson's tour, he will launch a solo career and no longer perform with his brothers. He would go on to place twenty-seven songs on the Billboard Top 40, while The Jacksons, as a group, never reached the chart again.