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Released: 1965, Recorded: 1954-55 Peaked: -- 13 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. I Wanna Play House with You 2. Door to My Heart 3. Baby It’s Love 4. I Gambled My Heart 5. Memories 6. Wishing (#10 UK) 7. Down the Line 8. Soft Place in My Heart 9. Queen of the Ballroom 10. Gotta Get You Near Me Blues 11. Flower of My Heart 12. You and I Are Through

Review: “On its face, Holly in the Hills was seemingly one of the more artistically dubious Buddy Holly albums to appear posthumously. Built around Holly’s pre-Crickets recordings circa 1955, as part of the duo of Buddy & Bob, the familiar Holly voice is present and easy to appreciate, though he’s sharing the spotlight with Bob Montgomery and doing a repertory that’s steeped thoroughly in country music, complete with fiddle accompaniment (Baby It’s Love, I Gambled My Heart). Holly was beginning to discover rock & roll and work out a sound of his own, as demonstrated by some of the cuts here, but he was still a country artist and doing a lot of ballads in that idiom as well. Apart from I Wanna Play House with You, Wishing, and Down the Line – and as it happens, those three are killer tracks, worth the price of the album – little here resembles the sound that Holly subsequently became known for. All of it, however, is fine music, occupying a place in Holly’s career to what the Everly Brothers’ early Columbia sides represent in their history (though it is far more sophisticated than the Everlys’ sides). The presence of the Fireballs, a band managed and produced by producer Norman Petty, on several of the tracks, does bring the material up to a modern standard (circa 1965), and it’s easy to see why this record sold well, especially in England, where it rode the charts for six weeks and just missed the Top Ten. Holly in the Hills does represent a formative and legitimate component of Holly’s music, which is perfectly valid, and he does amazingly well in tandem with Montgomery on numbers like Queen of the Ballroom and Soft Place in My Heart – had rock & roll not come along, it would be easy to see these Buddy & Bob sides having opened a career in country music for the two of them that could easily have carried them into the 1960s before a very different audience from the one Holly actually ended up finding” – Bruce Eder, All Music Guide

Released: 4/14/58, Recorded: 1955-56 Peaked: -- 5 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. You Are My One Desire 2. Blue Days, Black Nights 3. Modern Don Juan 4. Rock Around with Ollie Vee 5. Ting-a-Ling 6. Girl on My Mind 7. That’ll Be the Day (early version) 8. Love Me 9. I’m Changing All Those Changes 10. Don’t Come Back Knockin’ 11. Midnight Shift (#26 UK)

Review: “The tendency of most critics is to dismiss this album, comprised as it is of the songs from Holly’s 1956 Nashville sessions, which yielded a somewhat too tentative, country-oriented sound that suited neither him nor the public. In actual fact, at least ten of the 11 songs on this LP (the one exception being the ballad Girl on My Mind) have aged almost as well as anything that Holly ever recorded. Rock Around with Ollie Vee, Blue Days, Black Nights, Ting-A-Ling, I’m Changing All Those Changes, Modern Don Juan, Love Me, Don’t Come Back Knockin’, and Midnight Shift are all decent, solid early rock & roll; he sounds too countrified by about half on much of the record, especially on the early version of That’ll Be the Day, but these were not bad records, even if they weren’t going to break his talent out to a mass audience. What’s more, at least at the time of his first sessions in January of 1956, few white artists and even fewer producers at major labels had yet figured out what mix of country, R&B, and blues worked on a rock & roll record. Given all of this, this is a better than decent album with one real gem (‘Rock Around with Ollie Vee’), and if not for the fact that they mostly feature a completely different lineup of musicians and were also contractually separate from the rest of his eventual output for Coral/ Brunswick/ Decca, roughly half of the songs here could have been filtered into either of Holly’s later official LPs without doing any violence to the newer material. Even the ballad You Are My One Desire – though it doesn’t really resemble much else that Holly ever did – is given a hauntingly passionate performance. That’ll Be the Day isn’t a revelatory piece of rock & roll history, but it’s a more substantial and enjoyable prelude to the main body of Holly’s career than it’s usually given credit for being, extending his serious legacy backward a full album” – Bruce Eder, All Music Guide

Released: 11/2757 Peaked: -- -- Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Oh Boy! (#10 US, #3 UK, #13 RB. Airplay: 1 million) 2. Not Fade Away 3. You’ve Got Love (#40 UK) 4. Maybe Baby (#18 US, #4 UK, #4 RB. Airplay: 1 million) 5. It’s Too Late 6. Tell Me How 7. That’ll Be the Day (#1 US, #1 UK, #2 RB. Sales: 1 million. Airplay: 3 million) 8. I’m Lookin’ for Someone to Love 9. An Empty Cup and a Broken Date 10. Send Me Some Lovin’ 11. Last Night 12. Rock Me My Baby

Review: “The debut album by the Crickets and the only one featuring Buddy Holly released during his lifetime, The ‘Chirping’ Crickets contains the group's number one single That’ll Be the Day and its Top Ten hit Oh, Boy! Other Crickets classics include Not Fade Away, Maybe Baby, and I’m Looking for Someone to Love. The rest of the 12 tracks are not up to the standard set by those five, but those five are among the best rock & roll songs of the 1950s or ever, making this one of the most significant album debuts in rock & roll history, ranking with Elvis Presley and Meet the Beatles” – William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

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Released: 2/20/58 Peaked: -- -- Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. I’m Gonna Love You Too 2. Peggy Sue (#3 US, #6 UK, #2 RB. Sales: 1 million. Airplay: 2 million) 3. Look at Me 4. Listen to Me (#16 UK) 5. Valley of Tears 6. Ready Teddy 7. Everyday (Airplay: 2 million) 8. Mailman, Bring Me No More Blues 9. Words of Love 10. You’re So Square, Baby I Don’t Care (#12 UK) 11. Rave On (#37 US, #5 UK) 12. Little Baby

Review: “When Buddy Holly & the Crickets broke through nationally in 1957, they were marketed by Decca Records as two different acts whose records were released on two different Decca subsidiaries – Brunswick for Crickets records, Coral for Holly records. But there was no real musical distinction between the two, except perhaps that the ‘Crickets’ sides had more prominent backup vocals. Nevertheless, coming three months after The ‘Chirping’ Crickets, this was the debut album credited to Buddy Holly. It featured Holly’s Top Ten single Peggy Sue plus several songs that have turned out to be standards: I’m Gonna Love You Too, Listen to Me, Everyday, Words of Love, and Rave On. The rest of the 12 tracks weren’t as distinctive, though Holly’s takes on such rock & roll hits as Ready Teddy and You’re So Square (Baby I Don’t Care) provide an interesting contrast with the more familiar versions by Elvis Presley. This was the final new album featuring Holly to be released during his lifetime” – William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

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Charted: 4/27/59 Peaked: 11 2 Sales: ½ million -- --

Tracks: 1. Raining in My Heart (#88 US) 2. Early in the Morning (#32 US, #17 UK) 3. Peggy Sue 4. Maybe Baby 5. Everyday 6. Rave On 7. That’ll Be the Day 8. Heartbeat (#82 US, #30 UK) 9. Think It Over (#27 US, #11 UK) 10. Oh Boy! 11. It’s So Easy 12. It Doesn’t Matter Anymore (#13 US, #1 UK)

Review: “This 12-track compilation album was rushed out within weeks of Buddy Holly’s death. It combines what previously had been credited as Crickets group-titles and Holly solo recordings, containing all eight of Holly and the Crickets’ Top 40 hits, 1957-1959: That’ll Be the Day, Peggy Sue, Oh, Boy!, Maybe Baby, Rave On, Think It Over, Early in the Morning, and It Doesn’t Matter Anymore, plus the chart entries Heartbeat and Raining in My Heart and the classics Everyday and It’s So Easy. There was more great Holly, of course, but this was an excellent single-LP compilation” – William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

Released: 10/60 Peaked: -- 7 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Peggy Sue Got Married (#13 UK) 2. Well…All Right 3. What to Do (#27 UK) 4. That Makes It Tough 5. Now We’re One 6. Take Your Time 7. Crying, Waiting, Hoping 8. True Love Ways (#25 UK) 9. Learning the Game (#36 UK) 10. Little Baby 11. Moondreams 12. That’s What They Say

Review: “The first Buddy Holly Story LP, released weeks after his death in February 1959, brought together all of his and The Crickets’ hits and was a strong seller. The inevitable second volume is more bits and pieces, gathering up some Holly evergreens that were never hits for him, notably Well... All Right, as well as unfinished and previously unissued recordings such as Peggy Sue Got Married” – William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

Released: 1963, Recorded: 1955-59 Peaked: 40 2 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Reminiscing (#17 UK) 2. Slippin’ and Slidin’ 3. Bo Diddley (#4 UK) 4. Wait ‘Til the Sun Shines, Nellie 5. Baby, Won’t You Come Out Tonight 6. Brown-Eyed Handsome Man (#3 UK) 7. Because I Love You 8. It’s Not My Fault 9. I’m Gonna Set My Foot Down 10. Changing All Those Changes 11. Rock-A-Bye Rock

Review: “Even with Buddy Holly four years in the grave, there were ‘new’ albums of his stuff coming out that were running circles around most of the competition, and Reminiscing was a prime example, a bluesy, hard-rocking, moody assembly of material gathered from across more than two years of Holly’s history, from among some of his last finished tracks and demos going all the way back to 1956 and extending up as late as his home-recorded demos of January 1959. Apart from Wait ‘Til the Sun Shines, Nellie – which he may well have done as a sentimental favorite – the main focus of the sound (overdubbed by the Fireballs under the guidance of producer Norman Petty) was rockabilly, sometimes of a very advanced kind…This release continues the pattern of Holly’s catalog generally being treated better in England than America” – Bruce Eder, All Music Guide

Released: 1964, Recorded: 1955-59 Peaked: -- 3 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Shake, Rattle and Roll 2. Rock Around with Ollie Vee 3. Honky Tonk 4. I Guess I Was Just a Fool 5. (Ummm, Oh Yeah) Dearest 6. You’re the One 7. Blue Suede Shoes 8. Come Back Baby 9. Rip It Up 10. Love’s Made a Fool of You (#26 UK) 11. Gone 12. Girl on My Mind

Review: “The second of the posthumously overdubbed albums, Showcase presented a number of rock & roll cover songs performed by Buddy Holly, most of them recorded during his sessions in Nashville in 1956. It was not Holly at his best, though the performances were often spirited” – William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

Released: 3/69, Recorded: 1956-59 Peaked: -- 13 Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Love Is Strange 2. Good Rockin’ Tonight 3. Blue Monday 4. Have You Ever Been Lonely 5. Slippin’ and Slidin’ 6. You’re the One 7. (Ummm Oh Yeah) Dearest 8. Smokey Joe’s Café 9. I Ain’t Got No Home 10. Holly Hop

Review: “Giant marked the tail end of the pre-revival Buddy Holly posthumous LPs – that is, it was the last album issued before the general public began developing a special awareness of Buddy Holly and his music. It’s also a very frustrating album and the release that divides more of his fans than any other record associated with him; on the one hand, it’s described by many critics as little better than a bootleg and an example of grave-robbing in progress, as it consists of demos and song fragments heavily redubbed and re-edited into complete songs by Norman Petty; to make matters worse, none of the sides here except for the instrumental Holly Hop are originals – everything else is a cover of songs written by or associated with Fats Domino, Little Richard, and the like. On the other hand, Giant is a fun album, if not quite a good one; it’s nowhere near as important as any of Holly’s official releases in his lifetime or as edifying as his sides as part of Buddy & Bob (released on Holly in the Hills), some of the overdubbing is a good distance away from what we can figure Holly would have allowed or done himself, and none of it would or could rate a place on a best-of Buddy Holly, but it’s still difficult to complain about most of this album, based on it as a listening experience; while not defending the specific choices made, nor the process or the practice behind it, can anyone imagine ten outtakes or song fragments from Bill Haley or Chuck Berry from the same era coming out this well? Or ten fragmentary, mostly unfinished songs by the Beatles showing up this way and sounding so good (then again, listeners did get that around the same time – it’s called Let It Be)? The renditions (one hesitates to call them Holly’s renditions) of Ain’t Got No Home, Good Rockin’ Tonight, Love Is Strange, Slippin’ and Slidin’, Blue Monday, and (Ummm. Oh Yeah) Dearest make this album worth hearing, even for purists” – Bruce Eder, All Music Guide

Released: 1971, Recorded: 1957-58 Peaked: -- -- Sales: -- -- --

Tracks: 1. Maybe Baby 2. That Makes It Tough 3. Crying, Waiting, Hoping 4. Lonesome Tears 5. That’s My Desire 6. Real Wild Child (#68 US) 7. Peggy Sue Got Married 8. Fool’s Paradise 9. Learning the Game 10. That’s What They Say 11. Reminiscing 12. What to Do

Review: “Remember was the last of the posthumous Buddy Holly albums to grace record stores before the revival of interest in his work that swept a new generation, comprised of millions of new listeners, into his orbit and provided the impetus for the wave of historical reissues that followed over the next thirty years. Not surprisingly, as with those early historical reissues, Remember came out in England, where Holly’s star shone brighter and longer than it had in America. The first side of the original LP was comprised of various odd sides released during Holly’s lifetime that had escaped inclusion on the web of LPs over the decades: the unanthologized B-sides Lonesome Tears (from ‘It’s So Easy’) and Fool’s Paradise (from ‘Think It Over’), the former showing off a chiming guitar solo and the latter a beguilingly innocent vocal from Holly; the Crickets rockabilly oddity Real Wild Child, credited to ‘Ivan’ and sung by drummer Jerry Allison (middle-name: Ivan), with Holly on guitar and backing vocal. Side two mostly consisted of songs that producer Norman Petty finished after Holly’s death, including the achingly lyrical late-era masterpiece Learning the Game, the ballad That’s What They Say, and the R&B-flavored rocker Reminiscing, a duet showcase for Holly’s voice and King Curtis’ saxophone. As with almost all every Holly album, Remember has been supplanted by superior compilations in the decades since its release, but it is still enjoyable listening and for all but the most hardcore fans, it’s got a few surprises amid the familiar gems” – Bruce Eder, All Music Guide