I spent most of my late summer in the cradle of Bob Dylan's newly accessible mind. Nights and early mornings were spent tracing through the music and the world that was Dylan before he was Dylan.
Before reading Chronicles, it was all too easy to point out the musicians who Dylan coulda-woulda-shoulda admired. There were the obvious influences from the perspective of Dylan fanatics: Woody Guthrie and his gang of merry Commies, Hank Williams, the Carter Family.
But Roy Orbison? Indeed, at almost the very beginning of Chronicles, Dylan writes a soaring paean to the legendary vocalist:
Orbison, though, transcended all the genres - folk, country, rock and roll or just about anything. His stuff mixed all the styles and some that hadn't even been invented yet. He could sound mean and nasty on one line and then sing in a falsetto voice like Frankie Valli in the next. With Roy, you didn't know if you were listening to mariachi or opera.
How is a reviewer supposed to write about Roy Orbison after reading an almost epic prose poem, by Bob Dylan himself, on the wonders of this musical giant? But to shift gears back toward the more self-indulgent aspects of this review, Orbison has been lingering in the back of my mind for years.
When I was a teenager, I began a secret love affair with the singer. I would grumble and pretend to be annoyed every time my mom switched the radio from the local college indie rock station to the golden oldies, but I was also excited. Even when I was a teenager, I found a thrill to Orbison's voice that I couldn't find in any modern music: the trilling crescendos and epic range of his voice made me think of him as the voice of God. There had to be something supernatural involved with Roy Orbison to make his voice so sweet and chilling at the same time.
Just listen to "Only the Lonely": it begins as that typical, glossy "Frankie Valli in the sky" pop song, until suddenly he appears: Roy Orbison in his blue cape of shattered glass and broken hearts. His voice encircles and encloses all of humankind; the grey-red punch of teenage loneliness sweeps through the landscape as he hopes for no more sorrow. I was fifteen the first time I heard "Only the Lonely," and as is the case for most fifteen-year-olds, I was desperately in love. And not the crazy, irrational love found on Dawson's Creek or the boring, staid love which results in romanticized short stories about holding hands underneath a table in a deli, but the type of teenage love where everything echoes back to those hidden feelings deep inside. "Only the Lonely" made me want to start crying, and I probably would have, if my mother hadn't been sitting next to me and singing along in her funny, sweet, off-key voice.
Article comments
1 - shane
Thanks for that beautiful piece of writing. Over the last few months I've really been getting into Roy. I used to just know "Pretty Woman" and "You Got It", but after hearing "You're Not Alone Anymore" from the Wilburys first album I knew I had to discover more about him. For my money, he's the best singer ever. Just when you think there's no way he can hit that final note of the song, he belts it out like some otherworldly deity. I agree with you about him needing to be rediscovered much like what has happened with Johnny Cash in the last decade or so.
One more thing, you're right on with your critique about the whole emo/screamo movement with their fake emotions and scripted torture.