8/28/2020 0 Comments Roy Orbison Songs
Finally, the awesome Coca Cola adverts -- which will have you laughing your ass off -- tell the rest of Bear Familys version of the story.Please enable JavaScript in your browser to use the site fully.
What is possible, however, is to discuss this gigantic wonder of a box set. The German label Bear Family has issued a seven-CD Roy Orbison retrospective from 1955 to 1965; it collects virtually every known Orbison recording from what has been tagged his golden decade. And when the folks at Bear Family say every known recording, they mean it. The first treasure trove is the material recorded by the Teen Kings in Odessa, Texas, which was the first version of Ooby Dooby, backed with Tryin to Get to You. There is also the Sun version, of course, with the backing side of Go Go Go and, of all things, the issue of Tryin to Get to You released by Orbison s former label boss at Je-Wel, Weldon Rogers (only it was Orbison s own take he was trying to pass off as his own). ![]() There is an entire CD dedicated to the complete recordings of the material recorded by the Teen Kings -- a first for any Orbison collection. In addition, the latter third of the last disc offers all of Orbison s Coca Cola commercials as a cap off (no pun intended) to the golden decade. In addition is an authoritative -- and most likely definitive -- musico-biographical essay by Colin Escott bound in hardcover (the cover for book and set are deep blue, of course), with over 100 photographs of Orbison posed, candid, in session, and reproductions of various artifacts from his career, including the jackets to his singles and albums and even his high-school drawings. Not only was it ugly, its sound was turgid even for the period. This Orbison box has pristine sound in most cases, and where it doesnt, it is certainly far superior to any other collection on the market -- foreign or domestic, featuring these tunes -- and far better than any of the semi-legal pirates. The material he wrote with Joe Melson, which included Only the Lonely, Blue Angel, and Running Scared, is featured to stand alone for its particular contribution to the Orbison legacy. While its true that earlier Orbison Melson collaborations are featured separately from this material on the set, it is because they were either A: recorded earlier as demos rather than as singles, or B: they aesthetically fit together better with other material from a particular year -- whether the material was with the Wink Westerners, the Teen Kings, or with Melson. Orbison, as both singer and songwriter, was a storyteller, a massive one, and what better way to document his legacy than to present it as an unfolding story with twists and turns in the plot along the way. In fact, the argument could be made for looking at creating archival sets in this manner if the artist warrants it. What the producers of the Bear Family set have done is instead issue tracks together from a particular year, where few takes were done. ![]() The reason is simple: The Sun and Teen Kings sessions were identical material recorded the same year and were similar in approach but not in sound. Its never been heard like this before, probably not even on the original masters. All of the drama and dynamic in Orbison s music comes through as if the moon were opening the clouds and shining through. In the lesser-known songs, Party Heart, The Crowd, Leah, Sleepy Hollow, Yes, the Orbison version of Love Hurts, and others, the full story emerges and we see the singer who believed in his voice but not himself emerge as a believer in both things. Orbison wanted big music for his voice, the bigger the mix the more he was able to push his limit, and this is true to a song across the entire collection. These are all minor tunes in the Orbison canon, but they do reveal his working process if not his best work.
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