He was played by Marshall Crenshaw, an artist who had already earned comparisons to Holly for both his look and music. Naturally, Buddy Holly makes an appearance, too. With a dazzling performance by Lou Diamond Phillips, miming covers of Valens’ songs recorded by Los Lobos, the film reminded ‘80s audiences just how cool ‘50s rockers were. The 1987 film La Bamba revived the legacy of Ritchie Valens from the footnote file of music history. Marshall Crenshaw – Crying, Waiting, Hoping On his 1986-87 tour with King of America backing band The Confederates, Costello often adopted an early version of his lounge crooner persona to belt “True Love Ways.” The accordion-driven band swings along just loosely enough to hold it together, but it’s Elvis pushing his nasal voice to its absolute limit that sells this. For what it is worth, Mick Jagger is reported to have stated that Teenage Head, released the same year as Sticky Fingers, did a better job at translating blues and rock to modern times. Their cover of one of Holly’s masterpieces, “That’ll Be The Day,” which was released as a bonus track on the reissue of their third album, 1971’s Teenage Head, sounds much like the original, if a bit fuzzier and scuzzier. The Flamin’ Groovies – That’ll Be the DayĬoming out of San Francisco in the mid-to-late 1960s, the Flamin’ Groovies were overshadowed by other bands from the city, but their longevity and clever and oft-changing retro sound (and lineup) eventually turned them into a cult band with claims to have influenced the development of power pop and punk. Though that scene might have been entirely fictional, as you watch Busey’s hypnotic performance you feel like you’re witnessing the birth of a new era. In the years before YouTube, it was, for most of us, the only way to experience Holly live, the way he was meant to be heard. Gary Busey gave a performance for the ages as Buddy Holly, singing and playing on the tracks. Suddenly, the gawky, bespectacled guitarist decided to shake things up with “Rock Around With Ollie Vee.” All the kids went crazy, as they rocked “to the rhythm and the blues.” The parents covered their ears, no doubt scandalized by lyrics like “I’m gonna shake it just a little in the middle of the night.” While the 1978 biopic The Buddy Holly Story might have played it fast and loose with the facts, there’s no denying the power of the music in the film. The local band was playing civilized music that everybody could enjoy. It all began as another quiet night at the roller rink. So rave on, Buddy, with these 36 fantastic covers of your songs.ģ6. That’s how often his songs have been covered by his admirers of yesterday and today. And frankly, we could have easily doubled it.
So we expanded the list to 36, his birth year. We were going to include 22 covers to honor Holly’s age but – in a testament to how much he accomplished in such a short time – that turned out to be not nearly enough. So, to remember him six decades on, we’re ranking the best covers of his songs – from “Rave On” to “Not Fade Away” to a host of deep-cut gems that deserve wider recognition. But in a few short years, he’d written and recorded some of the most foundational tracks of rock and roll.
Over at 22, Holly’s career had barely begun. “The Big Bopper” Richardson (in a last minute seat-trade with Waylon Jennings), and, of course, Buddy Holly. One night after an Iowa concert, that fateful plane crash took out a host of young pioneers of the first wave of rock and roll: Ritchie Valens, J.P. The so-called “Day the Music Died” occurred 60 years ago this month.
0 kommentar(er)
