Traveling Wilburys

**The Traveling Wilburys** were a British–American rock supergroup.  It was a group of five singers who came together to make two albums, groups of songs sold together.  The Traveling Wilburys were Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, and Jeff Lynne.  They made two albums: _The Traveling Wilburys: Volume 1_ and _The Traveling Wilburys: Volume 3_.  _Rolling Stone_ said Volume 1 was one of the 100 best albums of all time.

## Beginning

The Traveling Wilburys started in 1988.  The international department at Warner Brothers Records asked George Harrison to write a B-side song for his single, _This Is Love_.  In vinyl records, there is one song (or group of songs) on the top of the disc, and then the user can pick the disc up, turn it over, and have the record player play music on the bottom of the disc.  The top is called the A side and the bottom is called the B side.  In the late 1980s, most record companies sold single records with a famous song on the A side and a new song on the B side.  Harrison wrote _Handle with Care_ to be the B-side for _This Is Love_. Because some of Harrison's friends were there keeping him company, they decided to sing _Handle with Care_ together.  The record company decided _Handle with Care_ was too good a song to be a B-side, so they asked the men if they would make a whole album.

They did some of the recording in Bob Dylan's own studio in his outbuilding for his car.  They did some of the work in Dave Stewart's kitchen.  Stewart was in the band the Eurythmics.

## Name

The name "Traveling Wilburys" comes from "We'll bury." When he was recording his album _Cloud Nine_, Harrison noticed some errors in the recording and said "Well bury them in the mix."  At first the band was the Trembling Wilburys but they changed it to the Traveling Wilburys.

The musicians used pretend names for the album: George Harrison was "Nelson Wilbury," Bob Dylan was "Lucky Wilbury," Roy Orbison was "Lefty Wilbury," Tom Petty was "Charlie T. Jr.," and Jeff Lynne was "Otis Wilbury." This was meant as a joke and not to trick anyone.  The Wilburys were five fictional brothers who all had the same father, Charlie T. Wilbury Sr., but different mothers.

Inside the paper around the album, there was also a pretend history of the Wilburys: "The original Wilburys were a stationary people who, realizing that their civilization could not stand still for ever, began to go for short walks – not the ‘traveling’ as we now know it, but certainly as far as the corner and back."

## Songs

The Traveling Wilburys' first album, _Traveling Wilburys: Volume 1_ was released in 1988.  It reached #3 on Billboard's list of very good albums and sold enough copies for triple platinum.

- _Handle with Care_
- _Dirty World_
- _Rattled_
- _Last Night_
- _Not Alone Any More_
- _Congratulations_
- _Heading for the Light_
- _Margarita_
- _Tweeter and the Monkey Man_
- _End of the Line_

The song _Tweeter and the Monkey Man_ was written to make fun of the kinds of songs written by Bruce Springsteen up to that point.

The Traveling Wilburys' second album, _Traveling Wilburys: Volume 3_ was released in 1990.  Its title is not a mistake.  Harrison skipped the number 2 on purpose.

## Infobox (musical artist)

- **name**: Traveling Wilburys
- **image**: Wilburys leave their mark.jpg
- **caption**: A guitar autograph, signed by each member
- **background**: group_or_band
- **origin**: Los Angeles, California, US
- **years active**: –
- **label**: Wilbury