Line #33 Music/TheTravelingWilburys


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/travelingwilburys.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Pictured: Musical Awesomeness[[note]]Left to right: Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, and George Harrison[[/note]]]]
3
4	->''Well it's all right, riding around in the breeze,\
5	Well it's all right, if you live the life you please.\
6	Well it's all right, doing the best you can,\
7	Well it's all right, as long as you lend a hand.''
8	-->--'''"End Of The Line"'''
9
10	The Traveling Wilburys were a band comprised of Music/BobDylan, Music/RoyOrbison, Music/TomPetty, Music/GeorgeHarrison, and [[Music/ElectricLightOrchestra Jeff Lynne]].
11
12	For years, Harrison played around with the idea of forming a band out of established musicians who could come together as equals and make music by hanging out and jamming. This began to take shape during production of Harrison's eleventh studio album, ''Cloud Nine''.
13
14	Temporarily based in Los Angeles and away from his FPSHOT[[note]]Friar Park Studio, Henley-on-Thames[[/note]] home studio, Harrison had asked Lynne to help produce a b-side and arranged to record it at Dylan's garage studio. Before the session he and Lynne shared a meal with Orbison and invited him to join them at the recording and on the way there, they stopped by Petty's house to retrieve a guitar and asked him to come along.
15
16	And so, by sheer coincidence, some of the best musicians of the [=20th=] century came together to record a ''b-side'' before realization dawned that Harrison had found the band he'd been looking for.
17
18	One of the greatest [[SuperGroup supergroups]] of all time, this rare confluence of nearly 200 combined years of musical history came together in the very late 1980s to produce two albums (or so--see below).
19	-----
20	'''Discography:'''
21	* ''[[Music/TravelingWilburysVolume1 Volume 1]]'' (1988)
22	* ''Volume 3'' (1990)
23	-----
24	!!The Traveling Wilburys provide examples of the following tropes:
25
26	* AffectionateParody: Many of their songs come across as this - taking standard [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools rock lyric tropes]] and pushing them just a little bit too far into absurdity.
27	* AlienAbduction: Mentioned as a possible explanation for the title character vanishing in "Maxine".
28	* AllThereInTheManual: The Liner Notes and peripheral materials describe the group as members of some ancient clan of nomadic musicians, and give each member a Wilbury family name; a different one on each album. The group is apparently made up of half-brothers, all sons of [[ReallyGetsAround Charles Truscott Wilbury]], and different mothers.
29	* AnonymousBand: The members took on tongue-in-cheek alter egos, claiming to be half-brothers and the illegitimate sons of an itinerant singer named Charlie T. Wilbury. The Wilbury clan was given a fairly detailed backstory in the albums' liner notes courtesy of Creator/MichaelPalin. The members also used different names for each album, for a total of nine Wilburys.
30	* AntiLoveSong: "You Took My Breath Away" at first sounds like a love song, but is clearly not on the pro-love side of things.
31	* BSide: What "Handle With Care" was originally going to be, until the label executives heard it and decided an album was in order.
32	%%* BoDiddleyBeat: On "Margarita".
33	* CrazyJealousGuy: PlayedForLaughs in "Where Were You Last Night?"
34	-->''Where were you last year?\
35	You sure as hell weren't here!''
36	* DanceSensation: "The Wilbury Twist" invites the dancer to, among other things, fall on his ass, put his teeth in a glass, and put a blindfold on so his friends can get away from him.
37	-->''Could be YEARS before you're missed!''
38	* EmptyChairMemorial: The music video for "End of the Line" cuts to an empty rocking chair with Roy Orbison's guitar lying in it during his stanza, as he had died before shooting the video.
39	%%* GreenAesop: "The Devil's Been Busy" and possibly "Inside Out".
40	* IndecipherableLyrics: In "Margarita", largely because some of the lyrics appear to be an Indian language (AuthorAppeal for Music/GeorgeHarrison perhaps?)
41	* IntercourseWithYou: "Dirty World", according to WordOfGod[[invoked]], is an AffectionateParody of Music/{{Prince}}. Which means you get Music/BobDylan singing lines like
42	-->''You don't need no wax job, you're smooth enough for me\
43	[[UnusualEuphemism If you need your oil changed I'll do it for you free]]\
44	Oh baby, the pleasure be all mine\
45	If you let me drive your pickup truck and park it where the sun don't shine''
46	* InTheStyleOf: "Tweeter and the Monkey Man" was Music/BobDylan's attempt at writing a Music/BruceSpringsteen song.
47	* {{Joisey}}: "Tweeter and the Monkey Man", which also gives us examples of...
48	** MurderBallad: fused with surreal pulp in a manner reminiscent of Creator/QuentinTarantino.
49	** NotCheatingUnlessYouGetCaught: "Jan had told him many times, 'It was you to me who taught in Jersey everything's legal as long as you don't get caught"
50	** AffectionateParody of Music/BruceSpringsteen. Nearly every other line has a reference to one of his songs, and the scenario itself is a stew of every trope in his ouvre.
51	** NoNameGiven: The undercover cop in "Tweeter and the Monkey Man" is always referred to as "The undercover cop".
52	** ShootTheTV: The monkey man at the end. Apparently he objected to his portrayal in the news coverage.
53	** SoleSurvivor: Implied to be the fate of the Monkey Man.
54	** TransTribulations: Tweeter. Notable that it's taken seriously, and portrayed non-sexually.
55	* TheKnightsWhoSaySquee: After recruiting Roy Orbison just before a concert of his in Anaheim, Harrison, Lynne, and Petty kept punching each other and repeat "He's in our band, too!" in excitement.
56	* LineOfSightName: Reportedly the inspiration for ''Handle With Care'' came from Harrison looking over at the markings on a crate used to ship some of the studio equipment.
57	* ListSong: "Cool Dry Place", which is essentially about a rock star waking up at the end of TheEighties and wondering how he got all this ''stuff'' for making music.
58	-->''...reverbs we can't use, lots of [=DX7=]'s and old athletic shoes...''
59	* NoodleImplements: "Cool Dry Place" [[AddedAlliterativeAppeal mostly mentions musical machines]], with the addition of a few oddities.
60	** "Dirty World", too. Most of the items sound like they're taken from a car advert, but there are exceptions.
61	* PunnyName: The group's name originates from a piece of banter George Harrison and Jeff Lynne came up with while recording, in reference to mistakes: "[[FixItInPost We'll bury]][[note]]Wilbury[[/note]] [[FixItInPost them in the mix.]]"
62	* TheSchlubPubSeductionDeduction: "Last Night"
63	* SelfTitledAlbum: Twice.
64	* SpecialGuest: The Wilburys recorded a version of Music/TheBeatles' "I Call Your Name" as a tribute to Music/JohnLennon, with Music/RingoStarr added to the lineup as lead singer.
65	* SuperGroup: Big time. It's hard to imagine a more super group even being possible.
66	* UnInstallment: The two albums released by the Wilburys were titled ''The Traveling Wilburys Volume 1'' and ''The Traveling Wilburys Volume 3'', respectively. Tom Petty's solo album ''Full Moon Fever'' may count as an [[SpiritualSuccessor unofficial ''Volume 2'']]: Jeff Lynne was the producer for it as for the other two volumes, and some tracks feature contributions from some of the others.
67	** Jeff Lynne's solo album ''[[SoloSideProject Armchair Theatre]]'', released just three months before Volume 3, is a possible contender as well, especially noting the presence of George Harrison as one of the record's primary personnel.
68	** There's also a theory that "Volume 2" is WhatCouldHaveBeen if not for Orbison's death, a missing episode that was deliberately omitted as a sign of respect for Roy.
69	** Another story has it that the band members agreed while they were recording ''Volume 1'' that they'd never do a Volume 2 -- so they didn't.
70	** The [[Creator/RhinoRecords Rhino Entertainment]] complete works box set regularizes the disc numbering by including a DVD (containing a documentary and all the band's music videos) as disc two.
71	* VisualPun: In the "End of the Line" video, Roy Orbison's absence is noted with an empty rocking chair that nevertheless keeps on rockin'.
72	* VocalTagTeam: Obviously; all five pretty much share lead and backup vocal duties. EnforcedTrope on ''Volume 3'', where several of the songs were originally recorded with Dylan as lead vocalist and later overdubbed to add lead vocals by other members.

Context Music / TheTravelingWilburys