THE ORB RODE

When I saw that photo above, I thought it was photoshopped. Roy Orbison on a dirt bike? C'mon. He didn't seem like a grease under the fingernails sorta guy. Maybe it's his voice, it's so...smooth I guess is the word. Rich. Even on his early Sun stuff his voice had more polish than was typical of the label. So, curious, I went looking and found this caption: "Roy Orbison America singer March 1966 riding on a scramble bike at Hawkstone Park Shropshire." I'll be dipped in shit, turns out that he was a bike fiend, as was his wife Claudette. (She was killed in a motorcycle accident while the two were on a ride.)

Here's a mess of the biker's early stuff, a Coke commercial he did, and a later clip of him doing the song he wrote about his wife, backed by Tom Waits, Elvis Costello and Bruce Springsteen, amongst others.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Listen:

Roy Orbison - Rock House mp3 at Rocky 52
Roy Orbison - Ooby Dooby mp3 at Rocky 52
Roy Orbison - Go Go Go mp3 at Rocky 52
Roy Orbison - Domino mp3 at Retrolicious
Roy Orbison - Mean Little Mama mp3 at Mp3 Rockabilly
Roy Orbison - Dream Baby mp3 at MP3 Rockabilly

Roy Orbison - Coke commercial mp3 at The Podcast Place
Video:
Roy Orbison - Claudette at YouTube Live, with Tome Waits, Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello and others