Traveling Wilburys
mp3 (256kbps) ripped from cd
Tracks 01 - 10 from Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1
Tracks 11 - 21 from Traveling Wilburys Vol. 3
Tracks 22 - 23 Bonus Tracks

The Traveling Wilburys are the only supergroup that lives up to expectations because they underplay them. They never shoot for the moon on their 1988 debut, they simply lay back and have a little fun. Anyone expecting something monumental will be disappointed, yet that's precisely what's fun about it — Dylan, Petty, Harrison, Lynne, and Orbison are having such a good time that it's hard not to get caught up in the spirit of things. The songs? Well, the songs are on one level a mixed bag, a blend of easy rockers, folk-tunes, and silly jokes, but even if these might sound like throwaways on "serious" albums, they sound fresh, lively, funny, even heart-rending here. Apart from the two singles, "Handle With Care" and "End of the Line," the highlights belong to Dylan, who's having more fun here than he's had since The Basement Tapes (check out the Springsteen parody "Tweeter and the Monkey Man" for proof). If Lynne's production is a little lush and lavish for these roots rockers, it's nevertheless warm, welcoming, and appropriate, helping make Traveling Wilburys, Vol. 1 a unique record, different than anything in any of the members' own catalogs.
 
The Traveling Wilburys' second album, incongruously titled Vol. 3, sounds for all the world like a dead-ringer for their debut, but the feel is considerably different. It isn't that Roy Orbison sadly died shortly after the release of Vol. 1 (which does make a slight difference), it's that the guys are sounding like they're trying very, very hard to have fun — how else to explain the exhortation to dance around with underwear on your head on "Wilbury Dance." No matter how silly the first Wilburys record got, it was frequently clever and never self-conscious — the polar opposite of its sequel, actually. Occasionally, these guys do get off a couple of good tunes — they're seasoned professionals, after all, and they can make a throwaway like "She's My Baby" infectious — but they don't do it a whole lot, and the rest of the record is padded out with songs that try hard to be fun, but never are. It's unfair to lay the blame on the absence of Orbison, since if he was around, the results would likely to have been the same. After all, it's nearly impossible to capture lightning in a bottle once, and it's a fool's game to try to do it twice. 

01 - Handle With Care
02 - Dirty World
03 - Rattled
04 - Last Night
05 - Not Alone Any More
06 - Congratulations
07 - Heading For The Light
08 - Margarita
09 - Tweeter And The Monkey Man
10 - End Of The Line
11 - She's My Baby
12 - Inside Out
13 - If You Belonged To Me
14 - The Devil's Been Busy
15 - 7 Deadly Sins
16 - Poor House
17 - Where Were You Last Night?
18 - Cool Dry Place
19 - New Blue Moon
20 - You Took My Breath Away
21 - Wilbury Twist
22 - Nobody's Child
23 - Runaway