The vocalist Tom Petty considered the best alive: “He could sing”
Rock and roll was never defined by exceptional vocalists. There are certainly artists who can hold the audience in the palm of their hands every time they step out onstage, but for every Freddie Mercury who wows people with their range, there are also the Bob Dylans of the world where people wouldn’t take a second glance at them if they didn’t have the songwriting chops. While Tom Petty was born and bred listening to the first generation of rock and roll, he thought that Roy Orbison was one of the best vocalists to ever grace a stage.
And notice that last sentence: vocalist, not a singer. Anyone can sing a song if they have a few pints in them and get onstage at a karaoke bar, but Orbison was the epitome of what vocalists should be every time that he stepped onstage. Rock and roll may have been built on the ferocious sounds of Chuck Berry and Little Richard, but Orbison’s tender croon was like having an opera singer in place of a proper rock and roller.
While there was still a darkness to every one of his tunes, hearing him sing ‘Only the Lonely’ or ‘(Oh) Pretty Woman’ captured all of the teenage angst that any kid goes through. We all sometimes feel like no one understands our feelings at one point or another, and for a brief second, listening to his classics, Orbison seems to have all the answers hiding behind those dark glasses.
Petty wasn’t even the only one infatuated with Orbison. On their first tours through America, The Beatles had been starstruck opening for the crooner and had even based one of their first hits, ‘Please Please Me’, on Orbison’s overly dramatic delivery before George Martin suggested kicking the tempo up a notch.
Even after Petty had years of classics under his belt, his choice to form the Traveling Wilburys with George Harrison meant having to sit next to Orbison all day and try not to freak out. Despite the group coming together almost by happenstance, Petty had a feeling that Orbison knew just how good he was compared to his bandmates.
Regardless of having legends like Bob Dylan and Harrison in tow, Orbison towered above them all, with Petty telling SPIN, “He knew he was the best singer alive, but he hadn’t had a big hit record in a long time. God, he could sing! When he’d sing during the Wilbury sessions, we’d all just look at each other with big eyes. Even if he was just sitting at a table working out a song and singing, we’d go, ‘Roy, quit it, you’re driving me crazy.’”
Going through the first Wilburys album, every one of Orbison’s lines are pieces of solid gold, whether it’s his breathtaking solo feature on ‘Not Alone Any More’ or hearing him singing along with his buddies at the finale ‘End of the Line’. The supergroup did limp on to one more album after Orbison’s death, but without his spirit there, was there really any point in continuing?
Still, that doesn’t mean that Orbison’s presence had been forgotten or anything. He was always going to be a legend no matter what happened after his death, and whenever those old records come on, it’s always going to send a chill up the spine.
