Roy Orbison
The Very Best Of
SonyBMG

"He was now singing his compositions in three or four octaves that made you want to drive your car over a cliff. He sang like a professional criminal," wrote fellow Traveling Wilbury Bob Dylan when he first heard Roy Orbison. And with Mr. Zimmerman's well-known ability to tweak words to mean something else, this could be construed to be a huge compliment on his fellow Wilbury who would have turned 70 this year, having died in 1988 aged 52, just as the Wilburys were hitting chart success. This 'Very Best Of' is a 70th anniversary tie which celebrates and reiterates a unique pop sound and voice that could convey untold levels of emotion in every note.

The canon of Orbison's work is so well-known that it almost seems superfluous to try and find something new or different to say. Maybe that in 1964 Oh, Pretty Woman peaked at number one in the US and the UK, breaking the grip of four Scousers in a band called The Beatles. Or the b-side of The Everly Brothers 1958 hit All I Have To Do Is Dream, Claudette, was The Big O's tribute to his wife Claudette. Maybe you knew that The Big O recorded at the legendary Sun Studios, as well as having his own television show, but it is the songs, perhaps, rather than the facts that have stood the test of time. While straight-forward track listings in reviews are taboo at dB Magazine, I dare say that out of the following selection of the 24 tracks presented on this, there is at least one or two, dear reader, that you would recognise; The Big O's first hit 1956's Ooby Dooby, Oh, Pretty Woman, Only The Lonely, Claudette, Blue Bayou, California Blue, Crying, the Jeff Lynne-produced You Got It and Bono-produced Mystery Girl, both from Orbison's last album 'Mystery Girl', the list goes on. All outstanding, even the Pat Boone-ish-sounding, Willie Nelson-penned Pretty Paper.

This is indeed a 'Very Best Of' and with chart positions and a more than acceptable three pages of notes (although the non-chronological track listing did, as usual, pique me), the listener, young or not so young, is provided with a suitable overview of Roy Orbison and the impact his music left. Excellent!

Mark Liebelt