Two wheels a turnin', one girl a yearnin'

Continuing my trip back through the 1965 album charts.

17/10/65 : There Is Only One Roy Orbison - Roy Orbison


Not only is this is our first visit with Roy, it's only his fourth ever mention - he came up in passing in a Bruce Springsteen review and a couple of his singles got mentioned in the streaming list, but that's been it up until now. I guess a big part of that is that I don't think there's really anyone like Roy (as the album title so eloquently puts it) - my suspicion is that a whole album of him might prove to be too much, but let's see, shall we?

Actually, there's no danger of it being too much because it's only 28 minutes long - which is quite impressive for twelve tracks. I can't say I loved it, but he's definitely got a fine voice and it's a decent enough selection of songs with more variety than I was expecting and pretty good sound quality. And that's all I've got to say about it really!

We're all the way down at #16 in the charts this week on his fifth week of a twelve week run, with it peaking at #10 in its third week. The top five this week were the usual suspects of TSOM, The Beatles, Mary Poppins, The Rolling Stones and Andy Williams - this lot made up the top five for ten weeks in a row, so get used to them! We also actually have some new entries this week - Dusty Springfield (#11) and Manfred Mann (#12).

Wikipedia actually has a decent amount of text on the album compared to most recent visits, but there's very little content there - the only thing of interest is that "Claudette" was written by Roy for his wife in '58 and had already been a hit for The Everly Brothers, but by the time Roy got round to recording it they'd got divorced. However, by the time the album came out, they'd got back together and remarried - unfortunately, she died in a motorcycle accident the following year. The critics were mixed on the album, with Billboard describing it as "a first-rate fashion destined", whatever that means.

"Customers also listened to" The RIghteous Brothers, Chuck Berry, Dean Martin and Bobby Darin, which seems like a peculiar mix. I didn't mind this at all though, even if it was lacking a stand-out number or two to really draw me in.

10/10/65 - Impressively dull
24/10/65 - A fine folky album

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