1001 Albums - Number 8

The Crickets – The “Chirping” Crickets

After sojourning in the realm of jazz for a few albums we're now back in the familiar and comfortable territory of rock and roll. Buddy Holly and his group The Crickets, like Elvis, are clear forerunners to most of the music I listen to and write about here. The production might be super old-timey, with twangy guitars and barber shop style vocal harmonising, but the format and arrangement is really not so different to that of Meshuggah or Sigur Ros. The song 'That'll Be The Day' is found on this album and (assuming you haven't lived your whole life under a rock and don't know it) it gives a pretty good indication of what this band sounds like.

I wasn't looking forward to this one all that much but I have to say I rather like it. Sure the lyrics are pretty conventional (they all revolve around how crap it is to be dumped) and I can't attribute my fondness for this album to plain old 'balls' as I did with Elvis and Louis Prima but I think there's just some good old fashioned solid songwriting and competent performing here. On its own it doesn't make up for Sinatra but I have to say that the old 1001 albums seems to be coming up mostly positive so far.

Next up, Count Basie.