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Billy Lee Riley Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)

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1-CD Digipac with 40-page booklet, 35 tracks. Total playing time approx. 79 minutes.... more

Billy Lee Riley: Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)

1-CD Digipac with 40-page booklet, 35 tracks. Total playing time approx. 79 minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does the CD include recordings from the original masters?
A: Yes, the original masters were used except on the Darron Lee recordings and the two tracks from the 'Harmonica & The Blues' LP, Billy Lee Riley did for the 'Crown' label. These four tracks were taken from the original 45 rpm records as there are no masters available.

Q: I've heard that Billy Riley reocorded under several pseudonyms. Is that true?
A: Yes, Billy Lee Riley recorded under different pseudonyms like Darron Lee, The Spitfires (together with Roland Janes), The Megatons, Skip Wiley, Lightnin' Leon, and Good Jelly Bess! Some of the aliasses are included on the 'Rocks' compilation.

Q: Is it true that Billy Lee Riley recorded the 'Sun' 45 'Itchy' b/w 'Thunderbird' together  with Sonny Burgess?
A: Yes, both tracks were recorded on July 22, 1958 and the record 'Sun 304' was released under Sonny Burgess' name.

Q:
Which artists has Billy Lee Riley worked with as a session musician?
A: Billy Lee Riley worked as a session musician for artists like Jerry Lee Lewis, Jack Earls, Charlie Rich, Johnny Cash, Ray Smith, Rick Nelson, Jimmy Bryant, The Everly BrothersHerb Alpert, Sammy Davis Jr., The Beach Boys, Pearl Bailey... just to name a few .... He was multi-instrumentalist who played the guitar, bass and harmonica.

Q: Are there any other CDs in the 'Rocks' series you would recommend if I like the Billy Lee Riley one?
A: Definitely! We would suggest to check on Jack Scott (BCD15841), Bob Luman (BCD16985), Jerry Lee Lewis (BCD16396), Narvel Felts (BCD17594), Gene Vincent (BCD17134), Eddie Cochran (BCD17136) and Johnny Burnette (BCD16992).

Another milestone in our constantly extended ROCKS! CD series!
ROCKS! contains the most rocking recordings of Billy Lee Riley, a musician who deserved it but who never made it into the first league of rock 'n' roll!
In addition to his best rockers recorded for SUN Records between 1956 and 1959, 'Billy Lee Riley ROCKS!' presents recordings for several other labels.
Further stops between 1959 and 1992 were Phillips Int'l , Brunswick, Checker (as The Megatons), Jaro (as The Spitfires; with Roland Janes), Mojo, Myrl (as Darron Lee), Crown, Home Of The Blues, Enterprise, Rita and Hightone, a.o.
Linernotes by Bill Dahl.
Elegant Digipac and extensive booklet.

Billy Lee Riley was born October 5th, 1933 in Pocahontas, Arkansas. In 1955 he made his first recordings in Memphis and soon ended up with Sam Phillips and his SUN studio and label. In 1956 Trouble Bound was released with Rock With Me Baby as the flip. His first hit appeared in 1957 with Flyin' Saucers Rock and Roll, a number that was to become one of the most famous Rockabilly songs ever. Since Phillips devoted all his energy to the careers of his established artists like Jerry Lee Lewis, Riley left SUN Records in 1960 and founded his own label, Rita Records, along with guitarist Roland Janes. Two years later he moved to the West Coast and took on jobs as a session musician for the Beach Boys, Sammy Davis Jr. and Herb Alpert, among others.

In 1965 Mercury recorded one of Riley's concerts at the famous 'Whiskey a Go Go' in L.A. and released the material on LP. A few years later Riley turned his back on the music industry and went back to Arkansas, where he set up a construction business. In the course of the Rock 'n' Roll revival in the late 70's Link Wray & Robert Gordon recorded Red Hot and Flyin' Saucers Rock and Roll; finally Billy Lee Riley entered the stage for one show in Memphis in 1979 and then decided to work full time as a musician again.

In 1992 he was rediscovered by one of his biggest fans, Bob Dylan. He continued to perform with his mix of rock 'n' roll, blues and country, releasing records such as 'Hot Damn!' for Capricorn, nominated for a Grammy in 1992. He did not fully recover from a tumble in 2005, but continued to play live until shortly before his death on August 2, 2009.

Billy Lee Riley was a versatile musician, guitarist and harmonica player. We focus this issue of ROCKS! on his great rockers, not just from the early days of his more than 50-year career.

Video von Billy Lee Riley - Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)

Article properties: Billy Lee Riley: Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)

  • Interpret: Billy Lee Riley

  • Album titlle: Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)

  • Genre Rock'n'Roll

  • Label Bear Family Records

  • Preiscode AR
  • Edition 2 Deluxe Edition
  • Artikelart CD

  • EAN: 5397102175978

  • weight in Kg 0.2
Riley, Billy Lee - Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD) CD 1
01 Red Hot Billy Lee Riley
02 Got The Water Boiling Billy Lee Riley
03 Betty And Dupree Billy Lee Riley
04 Rock With Me Baby Billy Lee Riley
05 She's My Baby Billy Lee Riley
06 Is That All To The Ball (Mr. Hall) Billy Lee Riley
07 That's Right Billy Lee Riley
08 Flying Saucer Rock 'n' Roll Billy Lee Riley
09 Your Cash Ain't Nothin' But Trash Billy Lee Riley
10 Trouble Bound Billy Lee Riley
11 Thunderbird Sonny Burgess
12 Open The Door Richard Billy Lee Riley
13 College Man Billy Lee Riley
14 I Want You Baby Billy Lee Riley
15 Pearly Lee Billy Lee Riley
16 Arkansas Traveller Billy Lee Riley
17 Flip Flop And Fly Billy Lee Riley
18 Barefootin' (alt. take - undubbed) Billy Lee Riley
19 Long Gone Billy Lee Riley
20 Rockin' On The Moon Billy Lee Riley
21 Everybody's Twisting Darron Lee
22 My Baby's Got Love (Rita unissued) Billy Lee Riley
23 Red Hot (Rita unissued) Billy Lee Riley
24 Baby Please Don't Go Billy Lee Riley
25 Catfish The Spitfires
26 Teenage Letter Billy Lee Riley
27 Mean Woman Blues Billy Lee Riley
28 I've Been Searching Darron Lee
29 Nightmare Mash Billy Lee Riley
30 Searchin' Billy Lee Riley
31 Shimmy, Shimmy Walk -part II The Megatons
32 Speed Lovers Billy Lee Riley
33 The Way It Was Back Then Billy Lee Riley
34 The Little Green Men Billy Lee Riley
35 Flying Saucer Rock & Roll (alternative take 3) Billy Lee Riley
Billy Lee Riley K ay attracted an answer disc, Wendy Dawn's John, in which Kay hears the... more
"Billy Lee Riley"

Billy Lee Riley

Kay attracted an answer disc, Wendy Dawn's John, in which Kay hears the record and comes home to live happily ever after. Instead, here’s Kay in Memphis. In Billy Riley's former lives, he'd been a radio hillbilly singer in Arkansas, a rockabilly singer on the original Sun label (in fact, just possibly the best rockabilly singer on any label), a blues man (his Lightnin' Leon single fooled the compilers of the original Blues Records discography), and a club-a-go-go singer. He'd been an artist, backing musician, label owner, and producer. Some of his tracks had appeared on a Bo Diddley album, and he'd recorded under more pseudonyms and for more labels than anyone besides John Lee Hooker. In 1967, an album he recorded for his own Mojo label was acquired by Stax Records in Memphis. Riley was in Atlanta at the time but decided that Memphis was happening again.

Stan Kesler, known to Riley from his first go-round in Memphis, was running the Sounds of Memphis studio and that's where Riley recorded Kay with a sharp-tip funk groove. He resituated the song in Memphis aka Soul City USA, so the line about Ft. Campbell (the military base north of Nashville where Jimi Hendrix served), was gone. The gulf between Memphis and Nashville was never more evident. Riley's rhythm track was created by Kesler's in-house group: guitarist Charlie Freeman, bassist Tommy McClure, drummer Sammy Creason, and Jim Dickinson on keyboards. The wah-wah guitarist could be Riley himself. All the musicians were white, but this was funk from the ground up.

On the label, Kay was credited to Riley’s Libra Productions. Riley played Kay for Sam Phillips, who said it was Riley's finest record. "Sam suggested I play it for Shelby Singleton who had just bought all the old Sun masters and had formed the Sun International label," Riley said later. "I did all the arranging and I had part of the Memphis Symphony, the Memphis Horns. I had the cream of the crop on that one. Shelby bought the record and gave me a job as producer and moved me to Fort Walton Beach, Florida to produce in his studio there." Singleton licensed it on June 17, 1969, a couple of weeks before he officially bought Sun from Phillips. Soon after Riley left for Florida, Jerry Wexler at Atlantic Records whisked Kesler's studio group away to Criteria Studios in Miami, and Kesler himself left for Nashville. Once again, everybody was leaving town. Riley grew disillusioned, but lived to enjoy late acclaim for his early records. He died on August 2, 2009.  COLIN ESCOTT

 

Billy Lee Riley Classic Recordings 1956-1960 (2-CD)
Read more at: https://www.bear-family.com/riley-billy-lee-classic-recordings-1956-1960-2-cd.html
Copyright © Bear Family Records

Review 3
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Customer evaluation for "Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD)"
24 Jun 2020

Sehr gute CD

Ich würde die CD wieder kaufen

3 Aug 2019

Hier lebt die Rock’n’Roll-Geschichte auf.

Billy Lee Riley (1933 – 2009) war ein amerikanischer Rockabilly-Musiker, Songwriter und Produzent. Seine bekanntesten Hits sind ´Rock With Me Baby´, ´Flyin‘ Saucers Rock And Roll´ sowie ´Red Hot´.
Die „Bear Family“ hat ihm aktuell eine Folge ihrer „ROCKS!“-Serie gewidmet, dem Mann aus Pocahontas, Arkansas, der das Gitarrenspielen von einem dunkelhäutigen Farmarbeiter lernte.
Nach vier Jahren bei der US-Army machte Billy Lee Riley seine ersten Aufnahmen in Memphis, Tennessee. Auf 79 Minuten erhalten wir 35 Einzeltitel, die fast alle von den Original-Masterbändern stammen. Es sind die rockigsten Werke von Billy Lee Riley, hauptsächlich die Aufnahmen für „Sun Records“ zwischen 1956 und 1959. Auch einige Aufnahmen, die er unter Pseudonym aufnahm, sind enthalten.
Hier lebt die Rock’n’Roll-Geschichte auf.

4 Jul 2019

ROCKT !!!

Billy Lee Riley, was für eine Stimme !

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Press Archive - Billy Lee Riley - Billy Lee Riley Rocks - theaquarian.com
Press Archive - Billy Lee Riley - Billy Lee Riley Rocks - theaquarian.com These fond remembrances are due to Rocks (Bear Family Records), a red hot retrospective of Riley’s primal, earthy, roots-rockabilly (35 tracks!) that makes a strong argument for his inclusion into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame. With great liner notes by Bill Dahl, beautifully-packaged booklet, and remastered sound, Rocks rocks. Highlights include “Your Cash Ain’t Nothin’ But Trash,” “Arkansas Traveler,” “Flip Flop & Fly,” “Barefootin’,” “Everybody’s Twisting,” “Baby Please Don’t Go,” “Catfish,” “Mean Woman Blues,” “Nightmare Mash,” “The Little Green Men,” and a few versions of “Flying Rock ‘n’ Roll,” plus “Red Hot.” “My gal is red hot,” he once snarled, “your gal ain’t doodly-squat.”
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Press Archive - Billy Lee Riley - Billy Lee Riley Rocks - Old Time Review Having only just discovered Billy Lee Riley, I am left wondering how he could have slipped through the cracks of music history. The music is mostly standard Rockabilly fair with unique twists that are now commonplace in Rock music. His vocal style is distinctive, as is the musicianship surrounding it. ‘Bear Family Records’ have done an amazing job at showcasing this underrated artist; with a fine mixture of hits and deep cuts. If you are looking for an overview of memorable tracks from the career of Billy Lee Riley, this is the album to pick up. For those wanting to delve even deeper, they may want to check out other Riley albums available from ‘Bear Family Records’.
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Press Archive - Billy Lee Riley - Billy Lee Riley Rocks - now dig this The tracks underline his great versatility and range. He had many different voices and even man-ages to sound like Joe Turner on a powerful rendition of 'Flip Flop And Fly'. The covers of other familiar titles, 'Barefootin" (previously unreleased), 'Teenage Letter', 'Mean Woman Blues' and 'Searchin", are equally solid. The jazzy 'Arkansas Traveller', more basic 'Long Gone', strolling 'Catfish' and bluesy 'Shimmy, Shimmy Walk' are purely instrumental and merit their place in the set. 'Rockin' On The Moon' and 'The Little Green Men' are close cousins to 'Flyin' Saucer Rock & Roll' and the bluesy version of 'Red Hot' with harmonica is nice enough in its own right. 'The Way It Was Back Then', from 1994, is a rock n roll history lesson underpinned by a Bo Diddley beat. 'I've Been Searching' and 'Is That All To The Ball (Mr. Hall)' are both decent, brassy rockers. 'Open The Door Rich-ard', 'Everybody's Twisting', the silly 'Nightmare Mash' and odd 'Speed Lovers' are not in the same class as the others. It's always a pleasure to review a Bear Family CD as they invariably go the extra mile. The digipak comes with a superb 40-page illustrated booklet with authoritative liner notes by Bill Dahl and discography by Colin Escott, Bill Millar and Nico Feuer-bach. I would urge anyone out there lacking a Billy Lee Riley CD to snap this one up pronto. Harry Dodds
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Tracklist
Riley, Billy Lee - Billy Lee Riley Rocks (CD) CD 1
01 Red Hot
02 Got The Water Boiling
03 Betty And Dupree
04 Rock With Me Baby
05 She's My Baby
06 Is That All To The Ball (Mr. Hall)
07 That's Right
08 Flying Saucer Rock 'n' Roll
09 Your Cash Ain't Nothin' But Trash
10 Trouble Bound
11 Thunderbird
12 Open The Door Richard
13 College Man
14 I Want You Baby
15 Pearly Lee
16 Arkansas Traveller
17 Flip Flop And Fly
18 Barefootin' (alt. take - undubbed)
19 Long Gone
20 Rockin' On The Moon
21 Everybody's Twisting
22 My Baby's Got Love (Rita unissued)
23 Red Hot (Rita unissued)
24 Baby Please Don't Go
25 Catfish
26 Teenage Letter
27 Mean Woman Blues
28 I've Been Searching
29 Nightmare Mash
30 Searchin'
31 Shimmy, Shimmy Walk -part II
32 Speed Lovers
33 The Way It Was Back Then
34 The Little Green Men
35 Flying Saucer Rock & Roll (alternative take 3)