page_title: The Crickets
section_title: Early success
hierarchical_section_title: The Crickets / History / Early success
caption_attribution_description: Trading card photo of The Crickets. In 1957, Topps gum cards issued a series of movie stars, television stars and recording stars. They were part of their recording stars cards.
context_page_description: The Crickets were an American rock and roll band from Lubbock, Texas, formed by singer-songwriter Buddy Holly in the 1950s. Their first hit record, "That'll Be the Day", released in 1957, peaked at number three on the Billboard Top 100 chart on September 16. The sleeve of their first album, The "Chirping" Crickets, shows the band lineup at the time: Holly on lead vocals and lead guitar, Niki Sullivan on rhythm guitar, Jerry Allison on drums, and Joe B. Mauldin on bass. The Crickets helped set the template for subsequent rock bands, such as the Beatles, with their guitar-bass-drums lineup and the talent to write most of their own material. After Holly's death in 1959 the band continued to tour and record with other band members into the 21st century.
context_section_description: In 1957 Norman Petty arranged for the Crickets' recordings to be marketed under two separate names. The solo vocals were released as being performed by Buddy Holly, and the songs with dubbed backing vocals were issued as being sung by the Crickets. Petty reasoned correctly that disc jockeys might be reluctant to program a single artist too heavily but would play records by two seemingly different groups. Some disc jockeys referred to the band as "Buddy Holly and the Crickets", but record labels never used this wording until after Holly's death.
  In 1958, Holly broke with producer Petty and moved to New York to be more involved with the publishing and recording businesses. Allison and Mauldin chose not to move and returned to Lubbock. Holly now recorded under his own name with the studio musicians Tommy Allsup and Carl Bunch. Waylon Jennings toured with him shortly after the Crickets folded.
  Allison and Mauldin looked forward to rejoining Holly after he returned from a winter tour through the northern Midwest. In the meantime, Mauldin, Allison, and Sonny Curtis (a friend and collaborator of Holly's) began recording new songs as the Crickets, with vocals by Earl Sinks. While they were recording, it was announced that Holly had died in a plane crash while on tour.
caption: Trading card of the Crickets, 1957: (back row, left to right) Buddy Holly, Jerry Allison, and Niki Sullivan; (front) Joe Mauldin. Topps issued series cards featuring movie stars, television stars and recording stars. The Crickets were part of its series of recording stars cards.
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