369. Mud – Oh Boy (1975)

The Intro

Mud were always too in thrall with the 50s, and clowning around far too much, to go down in history as glam rock lynchpins, which is a shame as Tiger Feet is one of my favourite number 1s of the 70s, and Lonely This Christmas is one of the more memorable festive number 1s. But this third and final number 1 shows how stale they, and the movement that made them famous, was becoming.

Before

Fresh from the success of their Christmas number 1, Mud tried to gain a Valentine’s Day chart-topper with The Secrets That You Keep. They nearly managed it too, reaching three. Their next single was a cover of Oh Boy! by The Crickets, which had reached three in 1958 and came from their debut album The ‘Chirping’ Crickets. Meaning Chinnichap were only involved with production this time around, and soon, their partnership with the band was over.

Review

I can’t work out why Chapman and Chinn, who had proven time and time again how to get the best out of pop for several years by this point, chose to suck this rock’n’roll classic of all its energy and turn it into a stately stadium rock-style stompalong. It does the song and Mud a disservice, and although smothering the production with harmonies perhaps masks its weakness to an extent, it also means there’s barely any sign of singer Les Gray. In the original, Buddy Holly puts across brilliantly the excitement of waiting to meet a lover that night. You get none of that feeling here.

There’s also a strange section where a mystery woman sings too, which is even weirder when you watch it being performed in the video above. If you don’t, Mud briefly pretend to hang a cleaner who mimes this part…

After

Further Mud releases came thick and fast throughout 1975, but the band parted ways with Chinnichap and they left RAK. Moonshine Sally, L-L-Lucy and Show Me You’re a Woman all went top 10, and they were briefly joined by keyboardist Andy Ball. They also appeared in a bizarre musical comedy called Never Too Young to Rock. In 1976 they moved away from glam, and the number 12 hit Shake It Down was a decent stab at disco. A cover of Bill Withers’ classic Lean on Me was their final hit, reaching seven that December. That year, Gray was part of the Green Cross Code public information campaign Children’s Heroes.

By 1978 they were signed to RCA Records, and Brian Tatum had joined as keyboardist, but Gray decided to try a solo career and quit. Mud tried to carry on, and hired Margo Buchanan as their new singer, but they couldn’t recapture the spark, and they split in 1979. The original incarnation of the band performed one final time, at drummer Dave Mount’s wedding, in 1990.

In 1980 Gray began a new incarnation, dubbed Les Gray’s Mud, that he toured with in various incarnations for the rest of his life. While fighting throat cancer, he died in the Algarve, Portugal in 2004. Les Gray’s Mud continued as Mud II with the rest of the original band’s blessing. Mount died in 2006. Bassist Ray Stiles joined The Hollies in 1986 and is still with them now. Guitarist Rob Davis, known for dressing up as a woman on stage, had the most prominent career post-Mud. Following a chance meeting with dance producer Paul Oakenfold in the late-80s, he began writing lyrics to club tunes. In 2000 he had two number 1 smashes – Toca’s Miracle by Fragma and then Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love) by Spiller. Most famously, he co-wrote Kylie Minogue’s classic Can’t Get You Out of My Head with Cathy Dennis in 2001.

The Outro

Oh Boy was, I think, Chinnichap’s last number 1, after several years of chart domination.

The Info

Written by

Sonny West, Bill Tighman & Norman Petty

Producers

Mike Chapman & Nicky Chinn

Weeks at number 1

2 (3-16 May)

Meanwhile…

3 May: West Ham United won the FA Cup for the second time, by beating Fulham 2-0 in the final at Wembley Stadium. Alan Taylor scored both goals.

84. Buddy Holly – It Doesn’t Matter Anymore (1959)

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The Intro

Ah. Now, unlike Russ Conway’s Side Saddle, here is a number 1 that I can clearly understand. Buddy Holly’s It Doesn’t Matter Anymore is the first posthumous UK chart-topper. The infamous plane crash that tragically cut short the lives of Holly and fellow stars Ritchie Valens and JP Richardson, aka The Big Bopper, occurred on 3 February.

Before

Holly had already been well on the way to becoming a musical legend. Since The Crickets had their sole number 1 with That’ll Be the Day in late-1957, Holly had achieved success with the group and under his own name, thanks to Peggy Sue, backed with Everyday, and Rave On.

In early 1958, he joined the rest of The Crickets to tour the UK and Australia. Later that year he met and fell in love with María Elena Santiago. The romance was swift – he asked her out when they first met, and proposed on their first date. Producer and manager Normal Petty didn’t approve, and asked Holly to keep their wedding quiet to avoid upsetting his fans. She pretended to merely be his secretary, but the damage was done – there was dissension in the ranks, not helped by the other Crickets also having their doubts in trusting Petty with all the money they were earning.

Despite money troubles, Holly had various interesting ideas about the direction his career would go, including making an album with Ray Charles and Mahalia Jackson. This suggests the 60s could have been a very different decade for pop had Holly not died.

He and Santiago settled in Greenwich Village, where he recorded acoustic songs including Crying, Waiting, Hoping. That October saw Holly’s final recording session take place. Four songs were recorded with an 18-piece orchestra, including It Doesn’t Matter Anymore and the B-side Raining in My Heart.

Review

It Doesn’t Matter Anymore had been written by Paul Anka, whose Diana had been number 1 directly before That’ll Be the Day. Still a teenager, Anka was, like Holly, prodigiously talented. Obviously the song’s title became eerily prescient, but it actually concerned the end of a romance. Chirpy pizzicato strings belie the singer’s bitterness at the break-up, as do Holly’s occasional trademark vocal stutters (which can be irritating to modern ears, it has to be said), but its lush production hinted at the future direction of pop, and displays Holly’s desire to experiment with his sound. Also, is it just me, or does this sound very similar to John Kongos’s He’s Gonna Step On You Again – later known as Step On by Happy Mondays?

After

As 1958 drew to a close, Holly parted ways with Petty. Despite the rest of The Crickets’ concerns, they decided to stay with their manager, so Holly left the band.

Due to Petty withholding his royalties, Holly was forced to immediately form a new band (featuring Waylon Jennings) and get out on the road. They began their ‘Winter Dance Party’ tour’, joined by Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper, but the tour was beset with problems, with buses breaking down and performers suffering from flu and even frostbite. Tired of being on the road, Holly decided to charter a plane to Fargo, North Dakota.

The story goes that The Big Bopper was suffering with flu, and asked Jennings if he would consider giving up his seat for him. When Holly found out his bassist wasn’t travelling with him, he quipped ‘Well, I hope your ol’ bus freezes up’. In a response that was to haunt Jennings for the rest of his life, he replied ‘Well, I hope your ol’ plane crashes’. Valens used to be terrified of flying, but asked Holly’s guitarist to toss a coin to decide who got to fly, and Valens won. The plane took off safely in light snow, but five minutes later, contact was lost. The plane had somehow cartwheeled across a frozen field, and Holly, Valens and Richardson had been thrown from the craft, with the pilot caught in the wreckage. All four had died instantly.

The incident shocked the music world, and was later immortalised by Don McLean as ‘The Day the Music Died’ in American Pie. Anka kindly gave the royalties of his song to Holly’s widow, who suffered a miscarriage when she was told of her husband’s death.

The Outro

It Doesn’t Matter Anymore proved posthumous singles offered music fans a way to mourn the heroes they had lost. It also showed record company bosses that it was a great way of making money out of dead artists.

The Info

Written by

Paul Anka

Producer

Norman Petty

Weeks at number 1

3 (24 April-14 May)

Trivia

Births

27 April: Singer Sheena Easton
3 May: Comedian Ben Elton
5 May: Echo & the Bunnymen singer Ian McCulloch
12 May: Director Deborah Warner

64. The Crickets – That’ll Be the Day (1957)

The Intro

By the autumn, 1957 had proved to be an important year in the music charts, but there was more to come. Future My Way songwriter Paul Anka’s Diana was prevented from a 10th week at the top by a new group known as The Crickets, led by the unassuming bespectacled figure Buddy Holly.

Before

Born Charles Hardin Holley in Lubbock, Texas on 7 September 1936, he was born into a musical family and learned to sing at a young age, drawing from diverse influences including gospel and country. The youngest of the Holleys was known by the nickname ‘Buddy’ from childhood.

When his brother Larry returned from service in World War Two he brought a guitar for his brother, and eventually he switched from piano lessons to learn his new instrument. It soon became apparent he was very talented, and Holly appeared on local television in 1952.

Three years later he was opening for rock’n’roll figureheads Elvis Presley and Bill Haley & His Comets. The following year he recorded an album of rockabilly with his new band, Buddy and The Two Tones, for Decca Records. Upon signing with them, his surname was misspelled, and Buddy Holly was born. The album was unsuccessful and Holly wasn’t happy with the sound he achieved with producer Owen Bradley, so he decided to head to New Mexico to record demos with Norman Petty. To avoid legal problems, a new name was needed for the group. They considered calling themselves The Beetles, but settled on The Crickets.

With Buddy Holly on vocals and lead guitar, rhythm guitarist Niki Sullivan, Joe B. Mauldin as bassist and Jerry Allison on drums, their resulting popularity helped define the classic four-piece band line-up.

Much happier with the results under Petty, they decided to release the new version of That’ll Be the Day as a single. Although written by Holly and Allison, Petty insisted on a writing credit too.

Review

It’s perhaps hard now to understand the impact That’ll Be the Day had in 1957. Much like Elvis and skiffle, it proved so influential, but unlike, say, Lonnie Donegan’s Cumberland Gap, it has aged, and is perhaps more comparable to Elvis’s All Shook Up – a little mannered and safe (the stuttering vocals can irritate), but a sign of great promise to come. The final line, ‘That’ll be the day when I die’ is still eerily prescient.

After

For an all-too-brief time though, the only way was up for Buddy Holly. He began churning out hits, and his name soon got top billing over the rest of The Crickets. His horn-rimmed glasses became hugely popular with teenagers, and future music legends John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, and Mick Jagger, to name but a few, were listening intently. Holly had one more number 1 to come, as a solo artist, but sadly he wasn’t around to enjoy it.

The Info

Written by

Jerry Allison, Buddy Holly & Norman Petty

Producer

Norman Petty

Weeks at number 1

3 (1-21 November)

Trivia

Deaths

4 November: Architect William Haywood

Meanwhile…

15 November: Flying boat City of Sydney crashed into a disused chalk pit on the Isle of Wight. The Aquila Airways Solent crash was at the time the worst ever air disaster to happen on English soil, killing 45 people.