ALBUMS: Roy Orbison’s Greatest Hits (1962), 4.5/$$$; All Time Greatest Hits (1986), 4.0/$$$. <both docked a half point for not having Pretty Woman.>
Orbison’s heydey was shortly after I was born. . I probably heard his songs Only the Lonely and Crying at sweaty sock hops in a gym in Indiana.
Hey what’s a guy and gal to do in rural Indy after corning cars, skating at the roller rink, and playing pinball at the laundromat.
So Orbison provided a lot of slow dance material. Sad rejection crying and whining even to some degree but it was slow dance material for sure.
Oh yeah I forgot to mention there were hay rides.
I was the new kid coming from Georgia to a place that didn’t get many new kids. I didn’t know to much about hay rides but I said:
“Hey.”
Now.
Indiana, where I lived for three years growing up — 7th, 8th and 9th grades — is loaded with coming-of-age tales — and I don’t mean that sexually, well maybe I do: we were puppets of a biological force we had no idea how to control or live with. My school was called Klondike Junior High School and our nickname was the Nuggets.
In Indiana?
Where the only gold was corn aging in the fields, awaiting frustrated teenagers to come and get these hard golden kernels to rattle some car radiators.
But I digress. Damn did I digress.
Roy Orbison. His voice was one of the best in rock music. You’ve heard of singers who can break a light bulb with the sonic frequencies. Well Orbison’s multi-octave voice could unscrew the light bulb, set it gently down on a bed of feathers.
Roy Orbison singing for the lonely, hey I want you and I want you only — “Thunder Road,” Bruce Springsteen.
WIkipedia writes: Tim Goodwin, who conducted the orchestra that backed Orbison in Bulgaria, had been told that Orbison’s voice would be a singular experience to hear. When Orbison started with “Crying” and hit the high notes, Goodwin stated: “The strings were playing and the band had built up and, sure enough, the hair on the back of my neck just all started standing up. It was an incredible physical sensation .
The video below was of the Traveling Willburys filmed after Roy died. His voice is on it and note Orbison’s framed portrait on the wall..
These albums I own have virtually the same line-up, but there is one big difference. The second, newer one, is re-recorded. Yes, they are not the original hits, which ticked me off — and i’m sure others felt the same way when they found out. It’s not prominently mentioned on the cover. But after getting over the initial ripped-off feeling, I listened to it and, you know, it’s not bad. Heck, if Roy Orbison needs to be covered, who better than the Big O.
Musically the sound is a little softer on the re-recorded one, but it’s still Orbison’s voice on this double album.