Composers: Norman Petty & Charles Hardin
Holly Original performer: Buddy Holly
(1957)
Recording date:
January
1964 Recording location: Regent
Sound Studios, London
Producer: Andrew
Oldham
Engineer: Bill
Farley
Performed
onstage: 1964-66,
1994-95
Probable line-up:
Drums: Charlie
Watts
Bass: Bill
Wyman
Acoustic guitar: Keith Richards
Electric guitar: Keith Richards
Vocals: Mick
Jagger
Harmonica: Brian Jones
Tambourine: Mick Jagger
Maracas: Mick
Jagger
Handclaps: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards & Brian
Jones
I'm going
to tell you how it's going to be
You're going to give your love to me
I'm going to love you night and day
Well love that's love will not fade away
Well love that's love will not fade away
My
love bigger than a Cadillac
I'll try to show it if you drive me back
Your love for me has got to be real
Before you can know just how I feel
Love real not fade away
Well love real not fade away
Yeah
I'm going to tell you how it's going to beTrackTalk
I suppose I suggested (we record) it. I have the song on an EP by Buddy Holly - he always seemed to go in for these Bo Diddley things. I mentioned it when we started talking about a new single. Well, we all tossed the idea around, and in the end we thought it was a good one because it had a vague tune - which does help commercially, and that's more than you can say for a lot of the tunes in that Diddley style, isn't it?
Although it was a Buddy Holly song, I
considered it to be like the first song Mick and Keith wrote,
in that they picked the concept of applying that Bo
Diddley thing to it. The way they arranged it was the
beginning of the shaping of them as songwriters. From then on
they wrote. At that time, Mick, Keith, and I lived together.
They were into the last half bottle of wine and going through,
it was one of those magical moments. When Keith played that to
me in the front room you could actually HEAR the record in
that room. What basically made the record was that whole Bo
Diddley acoustic guitar thrust. You heard the whole record in
one room. We gotta record it! But there's no way if
someone had just said coldly, Right, let's do "Not Fade
Away" that we would have wanted to do it without hearing
the way that Keith was playing it on the guitar. Keith just
did it. And that was that. To me, they wrote the song. It's a
pity we couldn't have gotten the money.
Keith played guitar on that track, Brian
the harmonica. The rhythm thing was formed basically around
the Buddy Holly thing. We brought the rhythm up and emphasized
it. Holly had used that Bo Diddley trademark beat on his
version, but because he was only using bass, drums and guitar,
the rhythm element is sort of a throwaway. Holly played it
lightly. We just got into it more and put the Bo Diddley beat
up front.