The Crickets

The Crickets embodied two distinct phases of activity, the first spanning barely eighteen months while the second stretched across many decades. Initially assembled by vocalist-guitarist Buddy Holly together with drummer Jerry Allison and bassist Joe B. Mauldin, the unit shifted from Holly’s backing ensemble to a fully autonomous band after re-cutting a track he had previously laid down under his solo name, thereby circumventing an existing contract. With Holly they enjoyed a string of successes that included “Maybe Baby,” “Not Fade Away,” and “That’ll Be the Day,” a run that ended with his death in 1959. Augmented by guitarist Sonny Curtis, the remaining members then sustained an extended career of independent recordings and sideman work, most prominently supporting Bobby Vee and the Everly Brothers. Their debut post-Holly long-player, In Style with the Crickets, introduced the original recording of Curtis’s “I Fought the Law”; by the mid-1970s, however, the group had ceased making records and concentrated on live performances, a focus sharpened by renewed attention following the 1978 release of The Buddy Holly Story. They resurfaced in 1988 with T Shirt, partly produced by longtime admirer Paul McCartney, and returned in 2004 with The Crickets & Their Buddies, revisiting signature material alongside Eric Clapton, Waylon Jennings, John Prine, Graham Nash, and additional guests.

The name “Crickets” itself originated as a contractual expedient. After Buddy Holly’s 1956 Decca Records agreement yielded two unsatisfactory Nashville sessions, he parted ways with the label and, with Allison and Mauldin, found a receptive producer in Norman Petty. Working at Petty’s Clovis, New Mexico, studio, the trio cut a fresh version of Holly’s earlier Decca track “That’ll Be the Day.” Coral Records expressed interest in the Clovis material, yet the prior Decca contract prohibited Holly from re-recording that song under his own name, so the new take appeared credited to the Crickets. Their rendition of “That’ll Be the Day” reached Number One in 1957, after which, for the ensuing fifteen months, releases issued as the Crickets and as Buddy Holly proved virtually indistinguishable; onstage the act was presented as Buddy Holly & the Crickets. By late 1958, however, mounting divergences—Holly’s broadening musical explorations, his relocation to New York and marriage to Maria Elena Santiago, and contrasting ties with manager Petty—precipitated a rupture in the months immediately preceding Holly’s fatal plane crash on February 3, 1959.

Following the split, Jerry Allison assumed leadership of the Crickets, who expanded to a quartet with the addition of Sonny Curtis on guitar and Earl Sinks as lead vocalist. Still under Petty’s management and production, they cut “Love’s Made a Fool of You” backed with “Someone, Someone” in 1959, yet the single failed to chart. A Coral Records version of Curtis’s “I Fought the Law” likewise vanished in 1959, while their treatment of “More Than I Can Say” gained traction only for Bobby Vee and, indirectly, for its composer Curtis. Additional Coral singles followed before the group moved to Liberty Records, where Jerry Naylor assumed lead vocals (occasionally trading duties with Curtis) and the band also collaborated with Buddy Holly soundalike Bobby Vee. Liberty tenure lasted from 1961 through 1965 and encompassed Beatles covers, though only “My Little Girl” and “Please Don’t Ever Change” registered as minor hits. One subsequent frontman, David Box, perished in a 1964 plane crash. The group enjoyed greater British success, headlining bills and backing the Everly Brothers, while appearing in the films Just for Fun (1963) and The Girls on the Beach (1965). By decade’s end Mauldin had departed the music business; Allison took over lead singing, and both he and Curtis worked as session players, the latter scoring a major triumph with “Love Is All Around,” the Mary Tyler Moore Show theme.

Allison and Curtis anchored the Crickets into the early 1970s, functioning chiefly as a touring unit though occasional releases surfaced on Mercury and MCA. The late-1970s Holly revival, spurred in part by The Buddy Holly Story, prompted a stable reunion that brought Mauldin back after more than ten years away from performing. Curtis exited in 1986 to pursue solo work and was replaced by Gordon Payne. The 1988 single “T-Shirt,” produced by admirer Paul McCartney, became a modest hit and yielded an Epic album of the same title. Carlton Records issued Too Much Monday Morning in 1996, featuring guest vocals from Nanci Griffith. In 2004 the band delivered The Crickets & Their Buddies, reinterpreting Holly-era songs with contributors including Eric Clapton, John Prine, Rodney Crowell, Graham Nash, Bobby Vee, and Waylon Jennings, whose part was tracked shortly before his death. Following Joe B. Mauldin’s passing in 2015 and the advancing years of the remaining members, the group withdrew from both recording and touring, though archival reissues continued and the 2012 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction sustained their legacy. The British Not Now label compiled the group’s complete 1957–1962 recordings on The Crickets Story in 2018. Jerry Allison, the final surviving original member, died on August 22, 2022, at the age of 82.