Buddy Holly - Buddy Holly (Mono)
Buddy Holly - vocals, guitar
Joe B. Mauldin - bass
Jerry Allison - drums
Niki Sullivan - rhythm guitar (A6)
Norman Petty - organ (A5), piano (B5)
Vi Petty - piano (A3, A5-6, B2), celesta (B1)
C. W. Kendall Jr. - piano (A3, B4, B6)
Al Caiola - guitar (B5)
Donald Arnone - guitar (B5)
Backing vocals (B5) : William Marihe, Robert Bollinger, Robert Harter, Merrill Ostrus, Abby Hoffer
1 LP, gatefold jacket
Original analog Master tape : YES
Heavy Press : 180g
Record color : black
Speed : 33RPM
Size : 12”
Mono
Studio
Record Press : Quality Record Pressings
Label : Analogue Productions
Original Label : Coral
Recorded April 8, 1957 – January 26, 1958 in Clovis, New Mexico and New York City
Produced by Norman Petty, Bob Thiele
Remastered by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio
Originally released in 1958
Reissued in 2017
Tracks:
Side A:
- I'm Gonna Love You Too
- Peggy Sue
- Look At Me
- Listen To Me
- Valley of Tears
- Ready Teddy
Side B:
- Everyday
- Mailman, Bring Me No More Blues
- Words of Love
- (You're So Square) Baby I Don't Care
- Rave On
- Little Baby
Awards:
TAS Super LP List! Special Merit: Informal
Michael Fremer's 100 Recommended All-Analog LP Reissues Worth Owning - Rated 61/100!
HiFi News Album Choice of the month - December 2017
Reviews :
“Buddy Holly's last album before "the day the music died" released in 1958 belongs in every rock-based record collection. It's not even a close call. And this reissue sourced from the original analog tapes still in superb condition and cut by Kevin Gray is by far the best sounding edition ever.
I was involved with the "Heavy Vinyl" version MCA issued in the 2000s also cut by Kevin and that one was good but not this eerily transparent and pure-sounding. In fact the original metal parts from 1958 still exist and I got to hear a new pressing made from those parts and this is better in every way.
Lubbock, Texas born Buddy Holly was 21 when he recorded this collection that includes "I'm Gonna Love You Too", "Peggy Sue", "Everyday", "Words of Love" and a few other originals and covers including Leiber and Stoller's "You're So Square" and Fats Domino's "Valley of Tears".
While Norman Petty's production sounds basic, the more you listen the more you appreciate the small but defining touches baked into some of the classic mono tunes, like the way the toms in "Peggy Sue" seem to undulate towards and away from you, making them sound like a steam locomotive. Or the thigh slapping rhythm section on "Everyday" behind which is the purest sounding celeste. Though these are sixty year old recordings they sound fresh and transparent as few productions today manage.
Of course the real wonder is Holly who makes the Stratocaster chime so purely and whose unique hiccuping vocal accents sounded otherworldly then and now. Where did he come from? I know. The small town of Lubbock but that hardly explains it. Sure there's country (Holly was signed to MCA in Nashville), NOLA and some Elvis but.....
The gatefold "Tip-on" packaging features an "outtake" cover photo inside and an iconic black and white shot of Buddy and The Crickets under which is a Graham Nash (The Hollies) quote. I think Chad Kassem got it from Graham when he was in town to play a gig and got a tour of the QRP pressing plant.
A must for everyone who collect American rock'n'roll...or any kind of music for that matter.” Michael Fremer, Analog Planet, Jun 5, 2018
"Buddy Holly released only three LPs before dying in an airplane crash in 1959 at the age of 22. These two reissues by Analogue Productions are Holly’s only contemporaneous recordings (the third was an archival release of material recorded in 1956). Notwithstanding his short career, Holly's influence on The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton, among many others, kept his flame alive. He was in the first class inducted into the Rock'n'Roll Hall of Fame, he was at the forefront of the singer/songwriter movement, and he established the composition of rock ensembles for the coming explosion, helping to invent rock'n'roll. His geeky big-glasses look made space for the Roy Orbisons and Elvis Costellos of the music world.
Brunswick and Coral, the labels on which these LPs were originally released, were subsidiaries of Decca Records. Decca reissued Holly’s greatest hits (essentially everything he recorded during his peak years) on the Coral imprint as The Buddy Holly Story, Volume I [CRL 57279] and Volume II [CRL 57326]. Given the timing, those much more common reissues, on the original plum-colored label, are as close to first pressings as most collectors get. Holly’s hits were also mastered anew by Steve Hoffman in 1985 and released as a two-fer LP set [MCA 2-4184]. The Coral reissues and Hoffman remaster are easy to come by on eBay for modest prices, so the choice to purchase these Analogue Productions reissues boils down two considerations: whether you want the music configured as it was first released and whether these LPs sufficiently improve on the sound of earlier releases.
These are both mono recordings, and neither possesses audiophile sound. Of the two, many cuts on the Buddy Holly LP have a more extended frequency range and sound best overall. It was recorded at producer Norman Petty’s studio in Clovis, New Mexico, and a Decca studio in New York City. The "Chirping" Crickets was mostly recorded on the road in Oklahoma at a makeshift studio, or at the Clovis studio. For late-1950s sound, they may not reach the peaks of the best Rudy Van Gelder recordings of the period, but they are still quite good. Both deliver solid, dynamic, stripped-down, in-your-face mono sound that seems appropriate to the material.
Both the Coral and MCA reissues reorganize the songs, and the packaging ranges from safe and solid (Coral) to lightweight and cheesy (MCA). Analogue Productions presents the original running order and artwork, and the covers, from Stoughton Printing, are first-rate. If all of that doesn’t have you reaching for your wallet, then the improvement in sound should. Kevin Gray’s remastering breathes new life into the music, enhancing tonality, dynamics and retrieval of inner detail. The sound of these reissues easily outstrips that of any prior releases.
These are two of the greatest LPs of the rock era and have always been high on my wish list for audiophile reissue. Replete with rock classics -- "Not Fade Away," "Maybe Baby," "That’ll Be The Day," "I’m Lookin’ For Someone To Love," "Peggy Sue," Everyday" and "Words Of Love" -- both offer a non-stop roller-coaster ride of important music that now sounds better than ever.” Dennis Davis, The Audio Beat, April 28, 2017
"Issued in 1958, with Coral and Brunswick getting as much out of Buddy Holly as possible by releasing a solo LP alongside a Crickets LP, it's an eponymous 12-track masterpiece with enough classics to have established the Texan rock pioneer as a genius. In fact, it's the same crew that compromised The Crickets, so "Words of Love," "Peggy Sue," "I'm Gonna Love You Too," "Rave On!" and the rest, are as much group efforts as the songs on its companion, The Chirpin' Crickets. Recorded in glorious mono, this superlative edition holds its own against my 50-year-old U.S. pressing, with only the oft-reprinted cover photo showing its age. The biggest surprise is that 60-year-old tapes can still yield such peerless sound quality." Ken Kessler, HiFi News, December 2017
“When Buddy Holly & the Crickets broke through nationally in 1957, they were marketed by Decca Records as two different acts whose records were released on two different Decca subsidiaries -- Brunswick for Crickets records, Coral for Holly records. But there was no real musical distinction between the two, except perhaps that the "Crickets" sides had more prominent backup vocals. Nevertheless, coming three months after The "Chirping" Crickets, this was the debut album credited to Buddy Holly. It featured Holly's Top Ten single "Peggy Sue" plus several songs that have turned out to be standards: "I'm Gonna Love You Too," "Listen to Me," "Everyday," "Words of Love," and "Rave On." The rest of the 12 tracks weren't as distinctive, though Holly's takes on such rock & roll hits as "Ready Teddy" and "You're So Square (Baby I Don't Care)" provide an interesting contrast with the more familiar versions by Elvis Presley. This was the final new album featuring Holly to be released during his lifetime. Every subsequent album was an archival or posthumous collection.” AllMusic Review by William Ruhlmann
Ratings :
AllMusic : 4.5 / 5 , Discogs : 4.74 / 5 , Michael Fremer : Music = 10/11; Sound = 10/11 , HiFi News : Sound Quality = 90% , The Audio Beat : Sound = 4/5; Music = 5/5