‘That’ll Be The Day’: the huge rock ‘n’ roll hit inspired by John Wayne
An icon of Hollywood’s golden age, few people can boast the same cultural impact as John Wayne. Emerging into the film industry back in the 1920s as a protégé of John Ford, Wayne went on to become a defining star of the western genre, famed for appearances in classic films from The Searchers to True Grit. Throughout it all, the actor remained an intrinsic aspect of popular culture in the United States, having an influence not just on film but also on the blossoming world of rock and roll music.
Upon initial glance, John Wayne might seem an unlikely influence on rock because he absolutely is. The actor was always pretty outspoken about his conservative outlook on life, regularly voicing support for causes like McCarthyism, the Vietnam War, and the presidency of Richard Nixon, to name only a few examples. Of course, ousting suspected communists from the film industry and supporting young men being sent across the world to be killed hardly reflects the rebellious attitudes of rock and roll, but that didn’t stop Wayne from influencing the landscape.
When rockabilly music first hit the airwaves during the mid-1950s, Wayne was arguably at the peak of his film career. His presence in pop culture was virtually unavoidable, and despite his own reservations about the rise of rock and roll, his influence inevitably bled over into this vibrant new youth movement.
In fact, John Wayne inadvertently influenced one of the most important and influential rock songs of all time, ‘That’ll Be The Day’. Penned by teenage prodigy Buddy Holly in the mid-1950s, the song arguably defined the early rock age and the birth of teenage subculture as we know it today. Seemingly, though, the track’s title was derived from a line of dialogue spoken by John Wayne in the 1956 film The Searchers.
Often highlighted – not least by Wayne himself – as one of the actor’s finest performances, The Searchers stars John Wayne as a Civil War veteran searching for his abducted niece during the height of the Texas-Indian wars. Upon the film’s release, its immense popularity set the standard for the rest of the western genre and contributed to Wayne’s typecast reputation as a stoic hero of the wild west.
Among those who went to see the film upon its release in 1956 was 19-year-old Buddy Holly, who had begun his recording career earlier that year. The film clearly left a mark on the songwriter, who adopted Wayne’s line “That’ll be the day,” from the film. The dialogue inspired the composition of Holly’s ‘That’ll Be The Day’, which he recorded with The Crickets and released in 1957.
That single ended up becoming one of the biggest hits of the rock and roll boom, topping the singles charts in both the UK and the USA, making the young Buddy Holly a global phenomenon. It remained one of his defining tracks throughout his career until his life was tragically cut short in 1959 at the age of 22. However, even after Holly’s death, ‘That’ll Be The Day’ remained an intrinsic aspect of rock and roll history, inspiring artists for multiple generations.
Seemingly, though, that song might never have come to fruition were it not for the inspiration of John Wayne and The Searchers. So, whether John Wayne approved of rock and roll or not, he managed to influence the pioneering anti-establishment youth movement in some way.
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