By August 1957, The Crickets were hot in the US with their first single, "That'll Be The Day" which, after a slow start, had been moving up the charts. On 2nd August, the group were off on tour, beginning at the Howard Theatre in Washington, DC. From then on, until the end of November, they toured almost without a break. Meanwhile, Brunswick were calling for an album and, although several tracks had been recorded in Clovis, a few more were needed. Fortunately there were a few short breaks in the tour and during September The Crickets recorded four tracks at the Officers Club, Tinker Airforce Base, Oklahoma City. Norman Petty and his trio were appearing there and the recordings were made 'after hours' on a portable Ampex recorder, when things were quiet.
Because of the urgency, and the need to continue with The Crickets sound as it was on both sides of their hit, Norman Petty took the tapes back to his studio in Clovis, New Mexico and decided to overdub background vocals on these and some other tracks which had been recorded earlier in Clovis. This may have gone against The Crickets own plans for finishing the album tracks and, when they heard the results upon the release of The "Chirping" Crickets LP in November 1957, there was some discussion about the obtrusive nature and style of background vocals on some of the finished recordings. Their first single's background vocals had been rehearsed with friends who 'honed them to perfection' as the group felt. "Not Fade Away" with their own overdubs, also sounded the way they thought it should. The addition of The Picks, a rather 'square' vocal group, did not always sound as integrated as the earlier recordings. For years, The Crickets, and many of their fans, wondered how the undubbed versions of the album tracks would have sounded. The wait is finally over...
We present, for the first time ever, 'Tell Me How' with the backing vocals removed. Taken from the remixed reissue of The "Chirping" Crickets album, released 23rd July 2023. See www.rollercoasterrecords.com for further details. Video re-uploaded to fix credit errors.