I might be the only person who likes Bobby Fuller (best remembered as the guy who originally recorded ‘I Fought The Law‘) better than his obvious inspiration and fellow Texan Buddy Holly. This is kind of like saying you prefer the Monkees to the Beatles. Fuller has none of the depth and resonance of Holly (hell, Buddy Holly basically established the idea of rock ‘n’ roll recording artists writing their own material) and was fairly minor figure in comparison… but, for whatever reason, his better songs sound exactly how 50s rock songs should sound to my ears: simple, driving, all wound-up and kinetic (exactly the same qualities that the Ramones brought back into the picture).
Really, the only thing that bothers me about Fuller is his occasional eerie resemblance to George W. Bush:
In terms of a song choice, ‘Let Her Dance’ doesn’t really constitute a sleeper, in the sense that it’s probably his third or fourth best known song. But, still, no one whom I talk about music with cares about this track, and it literally might be my favorite single example of 50s-style rock ‘n’ roll, so up it goes:
Let Her Dance — Bobby Fuller Four
Then, for something more sleeper-ish, it’s hard to resist ‘Don’t Ever Let Me Know’, the pretty B-side to the ‘I Fought The Law’ single:
I actually heard “Let Her Dance” in some context recently (can’t remember if it was the radio or a soundtrack to something) and was thinking how fantastic it is…