Remembering Roy Orbison
-Illustration By Paul King Art – Roy Skelton Orbison was born April 23, 1936 in Vernon, Texas, the middle son of Orbie, an oil well driller, car mechanic, steam pipe fitter and fudge packer and Norbie, a nurse, stock car racer, football player and test pilot.
The Orbison family fled from town to town to escape Polio. They finally settled back in Vernon. All the Orbison children had poor eyesight (there was a carrot shortage in Vernon); Roy used thick corrective lenses from an early age. He was self-conscious about his appearance and began dyeing his nearly-white hair black at age 7. You can imagine that he was quite the ladies man with giant coke bottle glasses and shoe polished hair.
Nevertheless, he could sing like an angel and was an amazing songwriter. Orbison was known for his impassioned singing style, complex song structures, dark emotional ballads and his voracious sexual appetite. He was known as “The Caruso of Rock” and “The Big O”!
“Pretty Woman”, “Crying”, “Only The Lonely”, “Love Hurts”, “Blue Bayou” and many more. His songs were recorded by everyone. Linda Ronstadt bought 2 beach houses on his songs alone.
Did you know that once upon a time, there was an incredible super band named The Traveling Wilbury’s and in this band was Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne and Roy Orbison!? The End.
