In March 1964, already five years after Buddy’s death, the Rolling Stones’ irresistibly urgent version of ‘Not Fade Away’ became their first UK Top Ten hit, and their very first single in the US. It even shared chart space in Britain for a short time with a posthumous 45 by Buddy and the Crickets, ‘You’ve Got Love’. 

The Stones’ cover was an indication of the pedestal they put Buddy Holly on, and was perhaps the moment that Jagger grew into the vocal presence we have known ever since.

Long before the advent of the Rollin’ (with an apostrophe) Stones, and with that unconscious synchronicity that informs so many rock and roll stories, Mick was singing with a local Dartford band doing covers of Buddy and Eddie Cochran, even as Keith Richards was buying ‘Peggy Sue Got Married’ and the compilation The Buddy Holly Story.

The US trade magazine Cash Box reviewed the Stones’ ‘Not Fade Away’ as a ‘wild, freewheeling full-sounding pounder that can take off in no time flat’. Norman Petty, Buddy’s former manager, told Record Mirror in 1964: ‘I was very pleased when the Rolling Stones recorded Buddy’s ‘Not Fade Away’. I’d like to see more of Buddy’s songs recorded by British groups as they’ve still got a great sound.’

That single had a profound effect on Jagger and Richards as the writing force they were soon to become. Said manager Andrew Loog Oldham: ‘The way they arranged it was the beginning of the shaping of them as songwriters. From then on they wrote.’

Paul Sexton