Background
In 1956, Roy Orbison was signed to Sun Records, the Memphis-based label that launched rockabilly legends such as Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins. Orbison's first releases reflected that style, including "Ooby Dooby", "Go! Go! Go!", and a song he wrote for the Everly Brothers about his future wife, "Claudette". Orbison found marginal success at Sun Records, but felt that his talents were not being employed appropriately because he was made to sing twelve-bar rock standards with heavy guitars and drums. [4]
In 1960, when he moved to Monument Records, Orbison's style changed to what he became known for the rest of his career. With "Only the Lonely", co-written with Joe Melson and recorded by Bill Porter, Orbison's songs turned to introspective and plaintive ballads fully employing his powerful three-octave vocal range, backed by larger and more intricate arrangements. [5] A recurring musical theme in many of Orbison's songs is a climax represented by a raw, emotionally vulnerable confession sung in an "eerily high falsetto", according to author Peter Lehman. [6]
Orbison was an atypical performer; while many rock and roll concerts were accompanied with frenetic performances onstage, Orbison rarely moved. k.d. lang, who later sang "Crying" with him in a duet, wrote in 2004: "It wasn't like Elvis: It wasn't like your loins were on fire or anything like that. It's more like Roy was a private place to go — a solace or a refuge." [7] Monument Records founder Fred Foster said of him, "He used such intricate, beautiful melodies. He brought a kind of baroque, classical style to pop music." [8]
Composition
Orbison later claimed that "In Dreams" came to him while he was sleeping, as many of his songs did. He often heard music while asleep, with a radio disc jockey announcing that it was Elvis Presley's new song. [9] Orbison was half-awake when he imagined "In Dreams", and thought, "Boy that's good. I need to finish that. Too bad things don't happen in my dreams." When he woke up the next morning, he wrote the song in twenty minutes. [10]
Like many of Orbison's songs, "In Dreams" rejects the typical song structure of rock music. [11] It begins like a lullaby with minimal acoustic guitar strums, with Orbison introducing the listener to "a candy-colored clown they call the sandman" half-spoken and half-sung in a Sprechgesang fashion. [6] The sandman puts him to sleep, and Orbison begins singing about dreams of his lover. Drums pick up the rhythm to follow the lyrics further into his subconscious, and a piano joins as the lyrics recount how Orbison spends time with her in his dreams, accompanied by breathy backup singers. Orchestra strings counter his melody, with the effect of representing a singing voice in themselves. [12]
Orbison's voice rises as he wakes up to find his lover gone. The climax is a powerful crescendo, as he cries "It's too bad that all these things / Can only happen in my dreams", and the resolution follows his voice from falsetto to the final note an octave below as he sings "Only in dreams / In beautiful dreams", as the other performers conclude with him abruptly. [12] The song never repeats a section; in two minutes and forty-eight seconds, it moves through seven distinct through-composed movements. [6]
Reception and legacy
The tormented narrative of [Orbison's] 1963 hit "In Dreams" veers unsettlingly between melancholy teenage romance and morbid adult obsession... Hearing his distinctive, plaintive voice sing, "I can't help it! I can't help it!" meant recognizing the real possibility that neither could you. Echoes of ranchera music offer bittersweet counterpoint from the lulling intro, through the aching verses to a finish that just seems to evaporate.
Robert Goldstein, National Public Radio (2011) [13]
"In Dreams" was recorded at RCA Studio B in Nashville on January 4, 1963, and released later the same month. "In Dreams" peaked at number 7 on Billboard's Hot 100 and spent 13 weeks on the charts in the U.S. [16] Cash Box described it as "a lovely, Joe Tanner ork-choral supported cha cha beat opus." [17] During the five months the song was on the charts, Orbison replaced guitarist Duane Eddy on a tour of the UK alongside the Beatles, whom he was not aware of at the time. British promoters were wary of Orbison as a draw, not considering him conventionally attractive and noting his stillness while performing. [9] The tour sold out in one afternoon, however. Orbison's first meeting with John Lennon was awkward, as Orbison was overwhelmed by the amount of advertising devoted to the Beatles when it was he who was supposed to headline the show. Beatlemania, however, was taking hold, and Orbison accepted that he was not the main draw of the tour, so he decided to go first on stage. [18] On opening night, the audience reacted intensely toward Orbison's ballads, as he finished with "In Dreams". Philip Norman, a Beatles biographer, later wrote "As Orbison performed, chinless and tragic, the Beatles stood in the wings, wondering how they would dare to follow him". After demanding Orbison play for double the time he was scheduled, the audience then screamed for a fifteenth encore, which Lennon and Paul McCartney refused to allow. The two held Orbison back from returning to the stage. [19] [20]
A compilation of Orbison's most successful songs was re-recorded in January 1986 and released in 1987 under the title In Dreams: The Greatest Hits. It coincided with the release of David Lynch's film Blue Velvet , which featured "In Dreams" prominently. Orbison was astonished and at first upset by the use of the song in Blue Velvet. [22] In the film, murderous psychopath Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper) is obsessed with the song, which he calls "Candy Colored Clown", and demands it be played repeatedly. In one scene it is lip-synced by his crony Ben (Dean Stockwell), making Booth alternately tearful and enraged. Later, Booth threatens Jeffrey Beaumont (Kyle MacLachlan) and beats him unconscious while the song plays from his car stereo and Dorothy Vallens (Isabella Rossellini) begs him to stop. Lynch later stated, "it is a beautiful song and it was written by Roy... Those lyrics, that feel meant something to him. And it just so happened that a song in a certain situation could mean something else. And the way that Frank Booth used that song in two different places, it is just kind of unbelievable. But I can see why Roy was upset because for him it meant a third thing." [23]
Orbison did not know of or authorize the use of the song in Blue Velvet, but it proved beneficial to his career, which had stalled in the 1970s. BAM magazine called the song "the emotional epicenter of the film". [22] Orbison biographer Ellis Amburn called "In Dreams" thematically appropriate in Blue Velvet because it implies that dreaming that is preferable to waking, and suggests that power and control is the true theme of the song rather than lost love. [22] The film made the song a cult favorite, and after seeing Blue Velvet several times, Orbison came to appreciate its use of the song. [24] Orbison re-recorded "In Dreams" again in 1987, for which Jeff Ayeroff brought Lynch to co-produce. [25] Leslie Libman directed a music video for this recording, featuring scenes from Blue Velvet interspersed with live-action shots of Orbison's image projected over a linen cloth blowing in the wind. [26]
In 2010, the song was used in an opening cinematic, and at the end of the first episode, for the video game Alan Wake.
In 2022, the song was also used in the first episode of Wednesday in a scene in which Morticia and Gomez Addams sing to each other. [27]
While listening to the Blue Velvet soundtrack on repeat during a sleepless night, Bono of U2 became fixated on "In Dreams". After eventually falling asleep, he awoke with another song in his head, which he at first presumed to be a different Orbison tune. This became "She's a Mystery to Me", a song written by Bono and The Edge for Orbison. It appeared on Orbison's final album, Mystery Girl , released in 1989. [28] On the same album, "In Dreams" received a companion piece, "In the Real World", written by Will Jennings and Richard Kerr. [29] Many of Orbison's songs either address dreaming or are presented in a dreamlike style. [30] In addition to the album released in 1963 and the re-recorded album of hits in 1987, a Canadian documentary on Orbison's life and impact on rock and roll also touched on the theme exemplified by the song; it was titled In Dreams: The Roy Orbison Story and released in 1999. [5]
Blue Velvet is a 1986 American neo-noir mystery thriller film written and directed by David Lynch. Blending psychological horror with film noir, the film stars Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, and Laura Dern, and is named after the 1951 song of the same name. The film concerns a young college student who, returning home to visit his ill father, discovers a severed human ear in a field. The ear then leads him to uncover a vast criminal conspiracy and enter into a romantic relationship with a troubled lounge singer.
Roy Kelton Orbison was an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist known for his distinctive and powerful voice, complex song structures, and dark, emotional ballads. Orbison's music is mostly in the rock music genre and his most successful periods were in the early 1960s and the late 1980s. He was nicknamed "The Caruso of Rock" and "The Big O". Many of Orbison's songs conveyed vulnerability at a time when most male rock-and-roll performers projected machismo. He performed with minimal motion and in black clothes, matching his dyed black hair and dark sunglasses.
Traveling Wilburys were a British-American supergroup active from 1988 to 1991 consisting of Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty. They were a roots rock band and described as "perhaps the biggest supergroup of all time".
Joe Melson is an American singer and a BMI Award-winning songwriter best known for his collaborations with Roy Orbison, including "Only the Lonely" and "Crying", which are both in the Grammy Hall of Fame and have both been included in Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. Melson was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2018.
Mystery Girl is the twenty-second album by American singer Roy Orbison. It was his last album to be recorded during his lifetime, as he completed the album in November 1988, a month before his death at the age of 52, and it was released posthumously by Virgin Records on January 31, 1989. It includes the hit singles "You Got It", which was co-written by Orbison and his Traveling Wilburys bandmates Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty, and "She's a Mystery to Me", written by Bono and The Edge. The album was a critical and commercial success; it peaked at number 5 on the Billboard 200 in the United States, the highest position Orbison had achieved on that chart, and number 2 on the UK Albums Chart.
"Handle with Care" is a song by the British-American supergroup the Traveling Wilburys. It was released in October 1988 as their debut single and as the opening track of their album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1. The song was the first recording made by the group, although it was originally intended as a bonus track on a European single by George Harrison. When he and Jeff Lynne presented the song to Harrison's record company, the executives insisted it was too good for that purpose, a decision that resulted in the formation of the Wilburys. The song was written primarily by Harrison, although, as with all the tracks on Vol. 1, the writing credit lists all five members of the band: Harrison, Lynne, Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty.
The Fastest Guitar Alive is a 1967 American musical comedy Western film, directed by Michael D. Moore with singer Roy Orbison in his only starring role as an actor.
In Dreams: The Greatest Hits is a two-record album set by Roy Orbison songs released in 1987 on Virgin Records. It was produced by Orbison and Mike Utley, except for the song "In Dreams", produced by Orbison with T-Bone Burnett and film director David Lynch. All songs are re-recordings by Orbison from 1986, except "In Dreams" from April 1987.
"Only the Lonely (Know the Way I Feel)" is a 1960 song written by Roy Orbison and Joe Melson. Orbison's recording of the song, produced by Fred Foster for Monument Records, was the first major hit for the singer. It was described by The New York Times as expressing "a clenched, driven urgency". Released as a 45 rpm single by Monument Records in May 1960, "Only the Lonely" went to No. 2 on the United States Billboard pop music charts on 25 July 1960 (blocked by Brenda Lee's "I'm Sorry") and No. 14 on the Billboard R&B charts. "Only the Lonely" reached number one in the United Kingdom, a position it achieved on 20 October 1960, staying there for two weeks (out of a total of 24 weeks spent on the UK singles chart from 28 July 1960). According to The Authorized Roy Orbison, "Only the Lonely" was the longest charting single of Orbison's career. Personnel on the original recording included Orbison's drummer Larry Parks, plus Nashville A-Team regulars Floyd Cramer on piano, Bob Moore on bass, and Hank Garland and Harold Bradley on guitars, Joe Melson and the Anita Kerr Singers on backing vocals. Drummer Buddy Harman played on the rest of the songs on the session.
Roy Orbison was an American singer-songwriter who found the most success in the early rock and roll era from 1956 to 1964. He later enjoyed a resurgence in the late 1980s with chart success as a member of the Traveling Wilburys and with his Mystery Girl album, which included the posthumous hit single "You Got It". At the height of his popularity, 22 of Orbison's songs placed on the US Billboard Top 40 chart, and six peaked in the top five, including two number-one hits. In the UK, Orbison scored ten top-10 hits between 1960 and 1966, including three number-one singles.
"Dream", sometimes referred to as "Dream (When You're Feeling Blue)", is a jazz and pop standard with words and music written by Johnny Mercer in 1944. He originally wrote it as a theme for his radio program. It has been and performed by many artists, with the most popular versions of this song recorded by The Pied Pipers, Frank Sinatra, and Roy Orbison.
"All I Have to Do Is Dream" is a song made famous by the Everly Brothers, written by Boudleaux Bryant of the husband-and-wife songwriting team Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, and published in 1958. The song is ranked No. 141 on the Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. The song is in AABA form.
"Blue Velvet" is a popular song written and composed in 1950 by Bernie Wayne and Lee Morris. A top 20 hit for Tony Bennett in its original 1951 version, the song has since been re-recorded many times, with a 1963 version by Bobby Vinton reaching No. 1.
Blue Velvet was the soundtrack of the film of the same name. It included original music by composer and conductor, Angelo Badalamenti. It was released in 1986 on Varèse Sarabande.
"Oh, Pretty Woman", or simply "Pretty Woman", is a song recorded by Roy Orbison and written by Orbison and Bill Dees. It was released as a single in August 1964 on Monument Records and spent three weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 from September 26, 1964, making it the second and final single by Orbison to reach number one in the United States. It was also Orbison's third single to top the UK Singles Chart, where it spent three weeks at number one.
"Not Alone Any More" is a song by the British–American supergroup the Traveling Wilburys from their 1988 album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1. It was sung by Roy Orbison and serves as his main contribution to the album. The song was written mainly by Jeff Lynne, although all five members of the Wilburys are credited as songwriters.
"Dream Baby (How Long Must I Dream)" is a song written by Cindy Walker which was first recorded and released by Roy Orbison originally as a non-album single in 1962. It was a big international hit for Orbison, reaching number 2 in both the Australian and the UK singles charts and number 4 in the U.S. Billboard. It was also a top ten hit in Canada and Norway. Five months later, "Dream Baby" was included on Orbison's Greatest Hits compilation LP.
"Birth of Rock and Roll" is a 1986 song written by Carl Perkins and Greg Perkins. The song was featured on the Class of '55 album which included performances with Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and Jerry Lee Lewis. "Birth of Rock and Roll" was released as a 7" single with a picture sleeve, 885 760–7, on the Smash/America label copyrighted by PolyGram Records produced by Chips Moman. The single reached No. 31 on the Billboard country chart and No. 44 on the Canadian country chart in 1986. The B side was "Rock and Roll (Fais-Do-Do)" which featured Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Roy Orbison. The theme of the song “Birth of Rock and Roll" is about how "Memphis gave birth to rock and roll" in the 1950s at Sun Records. A video of the song was also made featuring Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Ronnie Wood of The Rolling Stones as they drove to the historic Sun studios in Memphis, Tennessee in a white Cadillac convertible.
"Heading for the Light" is a song by the British–American supergroup the Traveling Wilburys from their 1988 album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1. It was written primarily by George Harrison but credited to all five members of the band. Harrison sings the song with Jeff Lynne, who also co-produced the track and, with Harrison, formulated the idea for starting the Wilburys. The song was issued as a promotional single in the United States, where it peaked at number 7 on Billboard's Album Rock Tracks chart. The song received a commercial release in Australia in 1989, where it peaked at number 88 on the ARIA singles chart.
"Inside Out" is a song by the British–American supergroup the Traveling Wilburys from their 1990 album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3. It was written by all the members of the band, which had been reduced to a foursome following the death of Roy Orbison in December 1988, and it was the first song they worked on for the album. The lyrics address environmental issues and describe a world turned yellow.
