{What I particularly enjoy about this rendition are the audience in the background who stand stock still while Buddy rocks!!}
You never think you’re going to live long enough to say:
“Imagine - fifty years ago, it’s like it was yesterday.”
Well, I have and it is.
I still remember where I was on February 3rd, 1959, when the news of Buddy Holly’s death in an aircrash came over the airwaves. He was 22 years old. I was sitting in the dining room doing my homework with Radio Luxembourg on really, really low so my father couldn’t hear it in the front room. Radio Luxembourg was banned in our house as Rock ‘N Roll was the work of the devil. I had to muffle my shock and the ensuing tears at the tragic news.
I absolutely loved and adored Buddy Holly. Still do.
He made all nerds look cool.
I knew all the lyrics to “Peggy Sue” and “That’ll be the day” and “It doesn’t matter anymore” was and is still one of my favourite songs of all time.
Every heartbreak I ever had, Bud’s voice would come into my ears, I’d hear the pizzicato violins, dah-dah-diddy-dah, and I’d start up:
There you go and baby here am I
Well you left me here so I could sit and cry
Golly gee what have you done to me
Well I guess it doesn't matter anymore
Do you remember baby last September
How you held me tight each and every night
Oh baby how you drove me crazy
But I guess it doesn't matter anymore
There's no use in me a-crying
I've done everything now I'm sick of trying
I've thrown away my nights
Wasted all my days over you
Now you go your way baby and I'll go mine
Now and forever till the end of time
I'll find somebody new and baby
We'll say we're through
And you won't matter anymore
There's no use in me a-crying
I've done everything now I'm sick of trying
I've thrown away my nights
Wasted all my days over you
Now you go your way baby and I'll go mine
Now and forever till the end of time
And I'll find somebody new and baby
We'll say we're through
And you won't matter anymore
No you won't matter anymore
You won't matter anymore
And it never failed to cheer me up. Thank you, Buddy.
I loved Buddy Holly too. One of the boys at school was a Holly fanatic and played all his records endlessly so I know them very well. His death was a terrible loss to rock, he was a real pioneer. And as you say, he made all nerds look cool.
ReplyDeleteI saw the stage show a few years ago and it was quite good, but then I never met anything even closely affiliated with BH that I didn't like!
ReplyDeleteHis arrangements, for the time, were astonishing for one so young.
XO
WWW
I had the same LP (The Buddy Holly Story?) and the same record player (Dansette?). I remember seeing him on the TV show Sunday Night at the London Palladium - he visited the UK the yaer previous - and he sang Oh Boy. He wrote his own songs and I have a feeling that without him there would have been no Lennon and McCartney.
ReplyDeleteOF
I was thirteen and very much into classical music at that time, so his death meant very little to me until a few years later, when I discovered rock and roll. Then his records became very much a part of my life, along with (yes, Old Fogey, you were quite right) my Dansette record player, a staple item in every British teenager's bedroom.
ReplyDeleteNext to "The Jolson Story", "The Buddy Holly Story" is one of my favourite musical bios...always a surprise to be reminded how young he was. I agree with your choice of "It doesnt matter..." as well as his very beautiful love song (title?) written for his wife, and presumably performed and recorded, with full orchestra,as the last song before he boarded the fatal flight...thanks for this post...lots of memories of high school dances to his music...
ReplyDelete"True Love Ways"...I have been playing and replaying it for the past 15 mins...tears streaming for reasons beyond anything to do with the tragic death of the performer himself.
ReplyDeleteI mentioned this in my blog today, WWW - a day late and a dollar short, as usual! ;-)
ReplyDeleteI tried to remember where I was, what I was doing, when the plane crash was reported in 1959, but I couldn't recall the event at all. I wasn't a big fan of Buddy at that time myself, but came to enjoy many of his records later on. "Raining In My Heart" was one of his I think- it helped me get over losing my first love when he disappeared without trace.
I found out years later that he'd been AWOL from the airforce.
Young and foolish eh! :-)
Yes, I can imagine he made quite an impact in his day.
ReplyDeleteSadly I'm an 80s child still hopelessly in love with the New Romantics.
What a memory to have - Buddy was wonderful indeed!
ReplyDeleteI just found your blog today . A very interesting one.
ReplyDeleteYour Buddy Holly post brought back memories of a high school pal that could do a very good imitation of Buddy.Ironically he died young in an accident too
How sad that such a talented man died so young, and how poignant your tears.
ReplyDeletexx