Trivia

The Cadillacs perform "Please Mr. Johnson" as janitors. Over two decades later, Earl Carroll (aka "Speedo", The Cadillacs' lead singer) was located working as a janitor in a South Bronx elementary school in NYC. He subsequently appeared in an Apollo Anniversary Show in February 1985 performing with The Cadillacs and began touring with the group again.

This was Ritchie Valens's only screen appearance. Tragically, four months before the film was released, he died in a plane crash that also claimed the lives of fellow rockers Buddy Holly and J. P. Richardson (a.k.a. "The Big Bopper"), and pilot Roger Peterson. "Ooh, My Head", the song Valens sings in this film, was later adapted by Led Zeppelin for their song "Boogie with Stu".

Buddy Holly and The Crickets were reportedly offered guest spots in this picture, but their producer/manager Norman Petty turned the offer down, over the objections of the group, because they would not be paid.

Ironically, the song performed by Ritchie Valens, "Ooh My Head", contains a reference to a Buddy Holly song with the line "No more Peggy Sue". Curiously, this line was left out when "Ooh My Head" was performed in the Valens biography La Bamba (1987).

Though the film was released in mid-1959, the artists who appear perform their songs from early 1958 and not the hit tunes advertised in promotional material as being in the film, as was often the case in Alan Freed films. "Donna" (1958-59) by Ritchie Valens, "Lonely Teardrops" (1958-59) by Jackie Wilson, "I Only Have Eyes For You" (1959) by The Flamingos, and "Just A Dream" (1958) by Jimmy Clanton, huge hits that are now Rock 'n' Roll standards, from the summer of 1958 through the end 1959, were all missing from the film.