The Chronicle's Bay Area musical history tour

The Musical History Tour is waiting to take you away. From its earliest days, the Bay Area played host to visiting musical greats and, over the years, produced more than a few of its own.

Through the area's rich history of beats and blues, jazz and folk, the revolutionary acid rock of the Fillmore and Avalon in the '60s, San Francisco and the Bay Area came to be known around the world as the birthplace of music that changed the way people listened - from Dave Brubeck and Johnny Mathis to the Grateful Dead, Metallica and Green Day.

All through out the Bay Area, traces of these musical legends can be found - you just have to know where to look. Join us now for the first part of a four-part series. Roll up for the Musical History Tour.

CANDLESTICK PARK

The Beatles played their final public performance Aug. 29, 1966, from a stage set up around second base at the Giants' baseball park. The Beatles, Led Zeppelin and the Sex Pistols made their final appearances before the death of a member in San Francisco, and the Who almost qualified for that distinction as well.

602 Jamestown Ave.

COSMO'S FACTORY

Creedence Clearwater Revival named the band's classic fifth album after their rehearsal hall in industrial Berkeley. For many years, it was the warehouse and stage shop for Berkeley Repertory Theatre, but it burned down in 2005.

1230 Fifth St., Berkeley

THE PLANT

When this recording studio opened as the Record Plant in a gala party on Halloween 1973, John and Yoko came dressed as trees. More than the studio where Fleetwood Mac made "Rumours," the Plant, at its height, was a hive where Huey Lewis and the News, Journey, Jefferson Starship, Van Morrison, Sly Stone and Stevie Wonder worked side by side in the studio's three rooms.

2200 Bridegway, Sausalito

SLY & THE FAMILY STONE

When he wrote and produced his first hit record, 19-year-old Sly Stone bought his parents this Ingleside house and took over the basement apartment for himself, which is where, in this quiet residential neighborhood, he first rehearsed the musicians who became Sly and the Family Stone.

700 Urbana St.

JIMI HENDRIX'S BAY AREA ROOTS

Not much remains of Savo Island Naval Housing, a set of bungalows around a park, where the 2-year-old - still named Johnny Alan Hendrix - was living with a friend of his grandmother until his father got out of the service and renamed the boy James Marshall.

Martin Luther King Jr. Way at Derby Street, Berkeley

DANA MORGAN MUSIC

The guitar store where Bob Weir met Jerry Garcia on New Year's Eve 1963 now sells beds, but that is the spot where the long, strange trip began.

534 Bryant St., Palo Alto

METALLICA HOUSE

The band rehearsed the classic heavy-metal albums "Master of Puppets" and "Ride the Lightning" in the garage.

3140 Carlson Blvd., Richmond

FILLMORE WEST

The auto showroom downstairs now parks cars upstairs on the dance floor of the '30s ballroom where Bill Graham threw rock concerts from 1968 to 1971.

Van Ness Avenue and Market Street

ROD'S HICKORY PIT

This landmark roadside diner was the site of some of the first performances by Green Day. The band members were so young, their mothers had to drive them to the gig.

199 Lincoln Road West, Vallejo

THE SERIES

Today: Rock 'n' Roll Landmarks Part 1

Wednesday: Rock 'n' Roll Landmarks Part 2

Feb. 9: Jazz and the Beats

Feb. 19: Hippies and the Haight