Norman Petty's studio in Clovis is one of the founding sites of rock and roll. From its opening in 1954 until Petty's death in 1984, the small building on West 7th Street recorded Buddy Holly, the Crickets, Buddy Knox, Roy Orbison, the Fireballs, and Waylon Jennings, among many others. Holly's "That'll Be the Day", "Peggy Sue" and "Oh Boy" were all recorded here, and the sound that came out — clean, layered, hooky — defined what early rock could be.
The studio is now operated as a museum by the Norman Petty Rock and Roll Museum trust. Guided tours, by appointment, take you into the original control room and the unchanged tracking room, with the original instruments and reel-to-reel machines still in place. There is no real signage out front; ring ahead.