There Is Only One

Performer: Roy Orbison
Producer: Jim Vienneau; Wesley Rose
Distributor: Sony BMG Music (Canada) (

Notes: Orbison explains in the liner notes that MGM will allow him "a new climate of freedom" as an artist, but the results of his first album for the label were unimpressive. He forsakes much of the rock & roll foundation of his classic early-'60s hits for Nashville country & western on most of the LP, complete with barroom piano. The material (mostly written by Orbison with various collaborators) doesn't approach the magnificence of his best work, and his version of his composition "Claudette" isn't nearly as good as the Everly Brothers' hit rendition from 1958. The highlight is the strange, almost rambling minor hit single, "Ride Away." ~ Richie Unterberger

Roy Orbison, a seminal rock & roll singer who initially recorded for the legendary Sun Records, created some of the most enduring hits of the 1950s and '60s. His near-operatic voice and dark, broken-hearted songs influenced a generation of artists. His songs and arrangements, almost symphonic in scope, set the template for pop sophistication in the early-to-mid-'60s. After a late-'80s comeback that included collaborations with Bono and Elvis Costello and a stint with the rock super-group the Travelling Wilburys, Orbison died of a heart attack in 1988.

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