Everyday - Buddy Holly (1957)
Our LCM classic this week 'Everyday' first released in 1957, is our special tribute to Buddy Holly who sadly lost his life in a plane crash on February 3rd, 1959. Rock and roll musicians Ritchie Valens, and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson together with pilot Roger Peterson were also killed in a plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa. The event later became known as "The Day the Music Died", after singer-songwriter Don McLean referred to it as such in his song "American Pie" in 1971.
At the time, Buddy Holly and his band, consisting of Waylon Jennings, Tommy Allsup, and Carl Bunch, were playing on the "Winter Dance Party" tour across the United States Midwest. Rising artists Valens and Richardson had joined the tour. The long journeys between venues on board the cold, uncomfortable tour buses adversely affected the performers, with cases of flu and even frostbite. After stopping at Clear Lake to perform, and frustrated by such conditions, Buddy chose to charter a plane to reach their next venue in Moorhead, Minnesota. Richardson, who had the flu, swapped places with Jennings, taking his seat on the plane, while Allsup lost his seat to Valens on a coin toss. Soon after takeoff, late at night and in poor, wintry weather conditions, the pilot lost control of the light aircraft, a Beechcraft Bonanza, which subsequently crashed into a cornfield. The event has since been mentioned in various songs and films. A number of monuments have been erected at the crash site and in Clear Lake, where an annual memorial concert is also held at the Surf Ballroom, the venue that hosted the artists' last performance.
"Everyday" is a song written by Buddy Holly and Norman Petty, recorded by Buddy Holly and the Crickets on May 29, 1957, and released on September 20, 1957, as the B-side of "Peggy Sue". On the original single the Crickets are not mentioned, but it is known that Buddy plays acoustic guitar; drummer Jerry Allison slaps his knees for percussion and typewriter; Joe B. Mauldin plays a standup acoustic bass; and producer Norman Petty's wife Vi Petty plays the celesta aka celeste (a keyboard instrument with a glockenspiel-like tone, used in such classical pieces as "Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy" from The Nutcracker). The song is a very economical 2 minutes and 5 seconds long. It is ranked number 238 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time".