About The Song
Written for Buddy Holly by his friend Paul Anka, It Doesn’t Matter Anymore would give the Lubbock-born singer a posthumous No.1 in the UK…
According to Sullivan, it was when Anka apologised to Holly after accidentally cutting the power to the onstage mics on a bill they were sharing, that their friendship blossomed. “From that incident, Buddy and Paul became very close,” stated Sullivan on the website Jeff Meshel’s World.
Paul Anka was, in every sense of the word, a teen idol. He recorded his first song at just 14 years old and scored his debut hit in 1957 at 16 with the self-penned Diana, which to this day is one of the best-selling singles by a Canadian artist. Other hits followed – You Are My Destiny, Crazy Love, Lonely Boy… this wunderkind from Ontario was a considerable chart rival to Holly at the time.
Which is what makes their friendship even more sweet. They should have been competitors, these two charismatic writer-performers, but formed a bond that remains rare among artists. So it was, that one of the last songs ever recorded by Buddy Holly, would be one penned for him by his teenage friend. It Doesn’t Matter Anymore may not, like Peggy Sue or Words Of Love, have a Buddy songwriting credit, but it’s still one of his defining tracks, and would make history as the first posthumous UK No.1, hitting the top spot as it did just a couple of months after Holly’s tragic death on 3 February 1959.
It Doesn’t Matter Anymore was laid down on 21 October 1958 as part of Buddy’s final studio session at New York’s Pythian Temple, alongside Moondreams, True Love Ways and Raining In My Heart. Known by fans as “the string sessions”, it would be the first and only time Holly worked with an orchestra, in this case an 18-piece ensemble composed of former NBC Symphony Orchestra members under the conductorship of Dick Jacobs.
It’s been claimed in the decades since that it was producer Norman Petty who chose those four songs, as an attempt to break Buddy from his rock’n’roll roots. Certainly, they’re among the least rock’n’roll of Holly’s recordings, but Petty always denied that he had anything to do with the choice of tracks. “Buddy picked the four songs himself,” Petty told the International Songwriters Association. “It was fun to try and get sounds that were different. I accept that I was probably to ‘blame’ for most of the changes, but it was always with the thought in mind to build something nice around Buddy, that was tasty in the way I viewed music, and yet acceptable in the way in which Buddy viewed music.”
By all accounts, it was a straightforward session, lasting just three-and-a-half hours, with Holly completing It Doesn’t Matter Anymore on his first attempt. Though its strings-backed sound was new to fans, the subject matter wasn’t. A classic tale about moving on from a relationship after suffering from a broken heart, it was written specifically for Buddy. As Anka recalled to RAM Entertainment, Holly told his friend he “wanted to do something like I did with You Are My Destiny with the violins.”
The song was delivered to Holly on the day of the recording itself. Presented to the session director Dick Jacobs, with barely any time to coordinate the violins or add any complex string elements, the orchestrator penned a pleasing pizzicato arrangement that perfectly complimented the singer’s evocative vocal.
The track was issued by Coral Records as a single, with Felice and Boudleaux Bryant’s Raining In My Heart as its flip, in January 1959, less than a month before Holly’s death. Making No.13 on the US Billboard chart, the song would reach No.1 in the UK in April 1959, remaining there for three weeks. It also hit No.1 in both Canada and Ireland, and peaked at No.2 in the Australian charts.
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Lyrics
There you go and baby here am I
Well you left me here so I could sit and cry
Well, golly gee what have you done to me
Well I guess it doesn’t matter anymore
Do you remember baby, last September
How you held me tight, each and every night
Well oops-a-daisy, how you drove me crazy
But I guess it doesn’t matter anymore
There’s no use in me a-cryin’
I’ve done everything and now I’m sick of trying
I’ve thrown away my nights and wasted all my days over you
Well you go your way and I’ll go mine
Now and forever ’till the end of time
I’ll find somebody new and baby
We’ll say we’re through and you won’t matter anymore
There’s no use in me a-cryin’
I’ve done everything and now I’m sick of trying
I’ve thrown away my nights and wasted all my days over you
Now you go your way baby and I’ll go mine
Now and forever ’till the end of time
I’ll find somebody new and baby
We’ll say we’re through and you won’t matter anymore
You won’t matter anymore