Famous Musical Homes!
With the 54th Annual Grammy Awards taking place this Sunday, I thought it would be fun to visit some Famous Homes that have helped make Music History!
Grateful Dead
710 Ashbury St., San Francisco. (below)
The Summer of Love took place in 1967 in the center of the flower-power universe: Haight and Ashbury. And right in the thick of things was the Grateful Dead, who famously occupied 710 Ashbury St. (above) from 1966 until 1968. It was there that Jerry Garcia and the gang spawned not just a new music scene, but a new pop culture era that bent all the establishment's rules.
That the Dead's transformational musical legacy was housed in a particular Victorian row house in The Haight neighborhood only makes the Dead so easy to find on our cultural and musical maps.
Part of the Hayes Valley real estate market, this Victorian was the site of the Dead's famous drug bust in 1967. Garcia managed to move on to bigger and more spacious digs later in life, including this Marin County home that was listed for sale in 2010.
Jefferson Airplane
2400 Fulton St., San Francisco. (below)
Jefferson Airplane hit the scene in 1966, a year before the Dead, and occupied a similarly famous Haight-Ashbury dwelling -- a Victorian at 2400 Fulton St. that was right near Golden Gate Park. Airplane founder Marty Balin talked about the place in a video he shot in 2009, when he revisited the house that is now privately owned: "Yup, 2400 Fulton St. This was the Airplane mansion. This was our office and at one point, we all lived here.
"It was quite a party pad. We had the Dead, Big Brother, Janice and anybody else in town would come over. We had a pool table in there and we had a recording studio in the basement," Balin said.
The house figured so much into the Airplane's early days they named a record after it: "2400 Fulton Street."
Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash
200 Claudill Dr., Hendersonville, Tenn. (below)
One of the most famous homes in country music -- or any musical genre, given the reach of Johnny Cash's career -- was the home of Cash and his wife, June Carter Cash. The property figured in the Cash bio-pic, "Walk The Line," and for nearly all of their 35-year marriage the Cash family lived in the massive, 13,880-square-foot home that ran along the banks of Old Hickory Lake.
The lake house was set on a solid rock foundation, the property had an outdoor swimming pool, bell garden, four large, 35-foot round rooms, seven bedrooms, and five full baths.
But it was more than a house. It was the spiritual home of Cash and the artistic and cultural universe he created, drawing the likes of Bob Dylan, evangelist Billy Graham, Carl Perkins, Brooks & Dunn, and other high priests and priestesses of the music industry, entertainment and political worlds. The place was memorialized in a song by Cash's daughter, Rosanne Cash, "House On The Lake."
After Johnny and June both died, six months apart in 2003, the house was sold to singer Barry Gibbs and his wife, who were undertaking a massive renovation. Their plan was to pay homage to Cash and his legend by inhabiting the famous home, but that never happened.
The home burned down during the remodel. The event prompted none less than the Oak Ridge Boys to remark that it might have been God's will; no one else but Johnny Cash was meant to live in that house.
The Mansion, owned by Rick Rubin
8134 Tianna Road, Los Angeles. (below)
He doesn't know how to work a sound board. He doesn't read music or play any instruments, but Rick Rubin knows what makes a good song and great records. That's why this producer is called a musical guru and his three-story, 1923 Spanish villa is considered one of the most deeply steeped venues in music history.
After starting Def Jam records with Russell Simmons, Rubin has continued to reinvent the music industry, marrying rap with metal and by bringing artists to record ground-breaking, career-shaping music in his mammoth studio, including: Johnny Cash, Neil Diamond, Jakob Dylan, Dixie Chicks, Slayer, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Jay-Z. While the guru now prefers to live on the beach at Malibu, his home continues to be a mecca for Grammy-making music.
Motown's Hitsville U.S.A.
2646 W. Grand Blvd., Detroit. (below)
This is the cradle of the Motown Sound. "Hitsville U.S.A." -- a former photographers' studio -- was Motown's first headquarters that Motown founder Berry Gordy bought in 1959. What came next was a recording studio where a nonstop creative churn filled the airwaves. The studio produced a sound that changed radio and the music industry with a stable of uber-talent.
Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross & The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson 5, Marvin Gaye, Tammi Terrell, The Four Tops, and The Temptations, who won the recording studio its belated first Grammy in 1972 for "Papa Was A Rolling Stone," all recorded there.
While Gordy finally moved to Los Angeles to create Hitsville West, the Motown sound will always be known for its birthplace in the Motor City, where Gordy mirrored the assembly-line approach of the car industry -- to sweeter strains.
Kurt Cobain of Nirvana
171 Lake Washington Blvd., Seattle. (below)
Unlike the homes where music history was made for all the right reasons, Kurt Cobain's home in Seattle made history for all the wrong reasons. The Nirvana front man who brought grunge music from the rain-slicked Pacific Northwest to a hungry world audience took his life in the greenhouse over the garage of his Denny-Blaine neighborhood home.
It was an abrupt and stunning end to a life and artist who had taken all the angst and swirling mix of nihilistic pessimism of his Aberdeen, Wash., childhood to a new musical frontier.
While his larger-than-life wife Courtney Love tore down the garage and sold the property in 1997, the cedar shake-sided house overlooking Seattle's Lake Washington continues to be a mecca for fans of one of music's most intensely talented and tortured souls.
Shangri-La Recording Studio
300065 Morning View Dr., Malibu, Calif. (below)
There are no shortage of real estate listings that tempt buyers with the invited sales pitch promising that the property is a veritable Shangri-la. In the case of the famous Malibu music studio that hosted milestone recording sessions for many top artists, it is a real "Shangri-La."
Bob Dylan with Robbie Robertson and Rick Danko of The Band.
Originally built by actress Margo Albert, who starred in the movie "Lost Horizon" and who aimed to recreate a mystical place, the Zuma Beach property continues to elicit ethereal performances from some of music's biggest stars: Bob Dylan, The Band, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Van Morrison, Ringo Starr, Joe Cocker and more.
The studio and living quarters have been described by The Band drummer Levon Helm as "a clubhouse and studio where we and our friends could record albums and cross-pollinate one another's music."
The place is a who's who in recording history, including the 2012 Grammy favorite Adele, whose song "Rolling in the Deep" was not only recorded at Shangri-La Ranch, but the music video was also filmed there.
Shangri-La Ranch went on the real estate market last May for $4.1 million.
Eagles
Beverly Hills Hotel, Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles. (below)
The dark and mysterious nature of the Eagles' mega-hit album stems from its use of one of the oldest literary tricks in the book: A weary traveler stops into an inn that at first glance holds a fascinating promise, only to entrap the traveler in its frightening confines.
While the Eagles have endured decades of miserable interpretations about what the title song of their all-time great recording meant, one element of the song and album reveals itself with some clarity: Since the cover of the album is a picture of the Beverly Hills Hotel, there's no mistaking that famous landmark as a metaphor for the trappings of American excess, particularly the Los Angeles music scene of the '70s.
"Hotel California" is Rolling Stone magazine's 49th greatest song of all time. It's one of the 500 songs that shaped rock 'n roll, according to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It won "Record of the Year" at the 1977 Grammy awards and it is ranked No. 8 in the Top 100 Guitar Solos list, according to Guitar Magazine.
As for the fabled hotel, it remains a beacon in the Beverly Hills real estate market and continues to stand out as a highly rated accommodation.
Bruce Springsteen
7 1/2 W. End Court, Long Branch, N.J. (below)
In 2009, fans of Bruce Springsteen beat out potential developers seeking to turn this commercial-area bungalow into another strip mall, or something.
What the fans recognized is that posterity was more important than bulldozers. Why? Because this is the house where Jersey's famous singer, songwriter and rocker penned the music for his breakout album, "Born To Run."
The home appears to have such special allure that in 2009, reports have it that Bob Dylan was found wandering in the rain near the 890-square-foot house. Given Dylan's respect for music history, with his affinity for legends like Hank Williams and Woody Guthrie, that all but cements the value of this little white refuge.
*This article is reposted with permission of Zillow. View the original item: "Famous Homes Where American Music History Was Made"
Grateful Dead
710 Ashbury St., San Francisco. (below)
That the Dead's transformational musical legacy was housed in a particular Victorian row house in The Haight neighborhood only makes the Dead so easy to find on our cultural and musical maps.
Part of the Hayes Valley real estate market, this Victorian was the site of the Dead's famous drug bust in 1967. Garcia managed to move on to bigger and more spacious digs later in life, including this Marin County home that was listed for sale in 2010.
Jefferson Airplane
2400 Fulton St., San Francisco. (below)
Jefferson Airplane hit the scene in 1966, a year before the Dead, and occupied a similarly famous Haight-Ashbury dwelling -- a Victorian at 2400 Fulton St. that was right near Golden Gate Park. Airplane founder Marty Balin talked about the place in a video he shot in 2009, when he revisited the house that is now privately owned: "Yup, 2400 Fulton St. This was the Airplane mansion. This was our office and at one point, we all lived here.
"It was quite a party pad. We had the Dead, Big Brother, Janice and anybody else in town would come over. We had a pool table in there and we had a recording studio in the basement," Balin said.
The house figured so much into the Airplane's early days they named a record after it: "2400 Fulton Street."
Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash
200 Claudill Dr., Hendersonville, Tenn. (below)
One of the most famous homes in country music -- or any musical genre, given the reach of Johnny Cash's career -- was the home of Cash and his wife, June Carter Cash. The property figured in the Cash bio-pic, "Walk The Line," and for nearly all of their 35-year marriage the Cash family lived in the massive, 13,880-square-foot home that ran along the banks of Old Hickory Lake.
The lake house was set on a solid rock foundation, the property had an outdoor swimming pool, bell garden, four large, 35-foot round rooms, seven bedrooms, and five full baths.
But it was more than a house. It was the spiritual home of Cash and the artistic and cultural universe he created, drawing the likes of Bob Dylan, evangelist Billy Graham, Carl Perkins, Brooks & Dunn, and other high priests and priestesses of the music industry, entertainment and political worlds. The place was memorialized in a song by Cash's daughter, Rosanne Cash, "House On The Lake."
After Johnny and June both died, six months apart in 2003, the house was sold to singer Barry Gibbs and his wife, who were undertaking a massive renovation. Their plan was to pay homage to Cash and his legend by inhabiting the famous home, but that never happened.
The home burned down during the remodel. The event prompted none less than the Oak Ridge Boys to remark that it might have been God's will; no one else but Johnny Cash was meant to live in that house.
The Mansion, owned by Rick Rubin
8134 Tianna Road, Los Angeles. (below)
He doesn't know how to work a sound board. He doesn't read music or play any instruments, but Rick Rubin knows what makes a good song and great records. That's why this producer is called a musical guru and his three-story, 1923 Spanish villa is considered one of the most deeply steeped venues in music history.
After starting Def Jam records with Russell Simmons, Rubin has continued to reinvent the music industry, marrying rap with metal and by bringing artists to record ground-breaking, career-shaping music in his mammoth studio, including: Johnny Cash, Neil Diamond, Jakob Dylan, Dixie Chicks, Slayer, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Jay-Z. While the guru now prefers to live on the beach at Malibu, his home continues to be a mecca for Grammy-making music.
Motown's Hitsville U.S.A.
2646 W. Grand Blvd., Detroit. (below)
This is the cradle of the Motown Sound. "Hitsville U.S.A." -- a former photographers' studio -- was Motown's first headquarters that Motown founder Berry Gordy bought in 1959. What came next was a recording studio where a nonstop creative churn filled the airwaves. The studio produced a sound that changed radio and the music industry with a stable of uber-talent.
Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross & The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson 5, Marvin Gaye, Tammi Terrell, The Four Tops, and The Temptations, who won the recording studio its belated first Grammy in 1972 for "Papa Was A Rolling Stone," all recorded there.
While Gordy finally moved to Los Angeles to create Hitsville West, the Motown sound will always be known for its birthplace in the Motor City, where Gordy mirrored the assembly-line approach of the car industry -- to sweeter strains.
Kurt Cobain of Nirvana
171 Lake Washington Blvd., Seattle. (below)
Unlike the homes where music history was made for all the right reasons, Kurt Cobain's home in Seattle made history for all the wrong reasons. The Nirvana front man who brought grunge music from the rain-slicked Pacific Northwest to a hungry world audience took his life in the greenhouse over the garage of his Denny-Blaine neighborhood home.
It was an abrupt and stunning end to a life and artist who had taken all the angst and swirling mix of nihilistic pessimism of his Aberdeen, Wash., childhood to a new musical frontier.
While his larger-than-life wife Courtney Love tore down the garage and sold the property in 1997, the cedar shake-sided house overlooking Seattle's Lake Washington continues to be a mecca for fans of one of music's most intensely talented and tortured souls.
Shangri-La Recording Studio
300065 Morning View Dr., Malibu, Calif. (below)
There are no shortage of real estate listings that tempt buyers with the invited sales pitch promising that the property is a veritable Shangri-la. In the case of the famous Malibu music studio that hosted milestone recording sessions for many top artists, it is a real "Shangri-La."
Bob Dylan with Robbie Robertson and Rick Danko of The Band.
Originally built by actress Margo Albert, who starred in the movie "Lost Horizon" and who aimed to recreate a mystical place, the Zuma Beach property continues to elicit ethereal performances from some of music's biggest stars: Bob Dylan, The Band, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Van Morrison, Ringo Starr, Joe Cocker and more.
The studio and living quarters have been described by The Band drummer Levon Helm as "a clubhouse and studio where we and our friends could record albums and cross-pollinate one another's music."
The place is a who's who in recording history, including the 2012 Grammy favorite Adele, whose song "Rolling in the Deep" was not only recorded at Shangri-La Ranch, but the music video was also filmed there.
Shangri-La Ranch went on the real estate market last May for $4.1 million.
Eagles
Beverly Hills Hotel, Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles. (below)
The dark and mysterious nature of the Eagles' mega-hit album stems from its use of one of the oldest literary tricks in the book: A weary traveler stops into an inn that at first glance holds a fascinating promise, only to entrap the traveler in its frightening confines.
While the Eagles have endured decades of miserable interpretations about what the title song of their all-time great recording meant, one element of the song and album reveals itself with some clarity: Since the cover of the album is a picture of the Beverly Hills Hotel, there's no mistaking that famous landmark as a metaphor for the trappings of American excess, particularly the Los Angeles music scene of the '70s.
"Hotel California" is Rolling Stone magazine's 49th greatest song of all time. It's one of the 500 songs that shaped rock 'n roll, according to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It won "Record of the Year" at the 1977 Grammy awards and it is ranked No. 8 in the Top 100 Guitar Solos list, according to Guitar Magazine.
As for the fabled hotel, it remains a beacon in the Beverly Hills real estate market and continues to stand out as a highly rated accommodation.
Bruce Springsteen
7 1/2 W. End Court, Long Branch, N.J. (below)
In 2009, fans of Bruce Springsteen beat out potential developers seeking to turn this commercial-area bungalow into another strip mall, or something.
What the fans recognized is that posterity was more important than bulldozers. Why? Because this is the house where Jersey's famous singer, songwriter and rocker penned the music for his breakout album, "Born To Run."
The home appears to have such special allure that in 2009, reports have it that Bob Dylan was found wandering in the rain near the 890-square-foot house. Given Dylan's respect for music history, with his affinity for legends like Hank Williams and Woody Guthrie, that all but cements the value of this little white refuge.
*This article is reposted with permission of Zillow. View the original item: "Famous Homes Where American Music History Was Made"
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