He Rode Buddy Holly’s Motorcycle In A Hotel Room
Early in his career, Jennings played bass for the beloved singer Buddy Holly. The two became close friends, so Jennings was understandably devastated when Holly was killed in a plane crash in 1959.
Before Holly’s death, he had purchased an Ariel Cyclone motorcycle, which Jennings remembered vividly. Holly’s father kept the bike until 1970, but eventually sold it.
For Jennings’ birthday in 1979, two of Holly’s Crickets tracked down the motorcycle and decided to surprise him with it. When Jennings saw the bike, he did what any outlaw would do:
“I walked into my hotel room after the show and saw it sitting there,” Jennings wrote in his autobiography Waylon: An Autobiography. “What else could I do? I swung my leg over it, stomped on the kick starter, and it burst into roaring life. First kick. It was midnight, and it sounded twice as loud bouncing off the walls of that hotel room. I knew Buddy wouldn’t mind.”
We have a feeling that he wouldn’t have minded at all. But the guests in the other rooms may have!