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LINK WRAY:
THE MISSING LINK…
BY ANDREW
DARLINGTON
2nd May 1929 -
22nd November 2005
Punk-rock, Grunge, Garage, Heavy Metal and
‘rock guitar’ in general… they can all
trace their roots back to Shawnee Rocker Link Wray…
in 1958 you could buy “Rumble” on a 78rpm
record. In 2005 you can buy the Link documentary ‘The
Rumble Man’ on DVD
Andrew Darlington recalls the tales…
****************************************
‘ROCKING
WITH THE ‘RUMBLE’ MAN…’
Link Wray perpetrated the
classic “Rumble” - the original master-blaster
of Rock ‘n’ Roll guitar, a huge 1958 hit he was
never able to follow. There are myths and legends
attached to the ‘Rumble’-man. How could there
not be? - we’re talking about events half-a-century
ago. Did they really blow the Diamonds off-stage with
their spontaneously improvised ‘Oddball’ which
they then perform a straight four times in succession?
Was it a Shawnee hunting knife or - as in another telling
of the tale, just a sharpened pencil-point he uses to
sonically perforate his amps? Was Archie Bleyer really
intent on junking the demo tape before overhearing his
teenage daughter’s rave-response? And how exactly do
you record on three-track… in a converted chicken-shack?
Who knows. Who cares. This is the stuff of legend. His
talent may have been narrow-band, but in his ability to
employ quivering distortion and shove the electric guitar
into places it had never gone before, he is assured his
place as an innovator. His finest tracks retain their
original menace and raw power. While his influence can’t
be overestimated - Pete Towshend was an early champion,
‘he is the king, if it hadn’t been for Link
Wray and “Rumble”, I would have never picked up
a guitar.’ John Peel also makes a point of
highlighting “Rumble” on his Radio One show.
Even Bob Dylan writes - in his ‘Chronicles’,
of being ‘hypnotized by the tone’ of Link’s
‘classic’.
Frederick Lincoln ‘Link’ Wray Jr was born of
Shawnee Native American stock in Dunn, Fort Bragg, North
Carolina in 1929, to impoverished semi-literate parents.
His father suffered shell-shock resulting from his
experiences in World War I. And the family live an
itinerant life, often sleeping rough, picking up casual
farm work, augmented by his mother’s street ‘brush’
preaching, while evading the Ku Klux Klan threat. ‘Elvis,
he grew up white-man poor. I was growing up Shawnee poor’
Link once told an interviewer, ‘Elvis came from
welfare, I came from below welfare’. He began
playing ‘geetar’ as an seven-year old kid,
tutored in bottleneck-slide by black blues-man Hambone,
‘I was brought up on the blues’ he told ‘Melody
Maker’, ‘- the painful music’.
At age thirteen the family migrates to Portsmouth in
Virginia, where - as the ‘Ranch Gang’, they
play the local circuit, with his brothers Doug (drums)
and vocalist ‘Lucky’ Vernon, a line-up
completed by Brantley ‘Shorty’ Horton (bass)
and Dixie Neale. They specialise in Western swing -
‘Rock ‘n’ Roll before it was Rock ‘n’
Roll’, doing Bob Wills and Hank Thompson songs,
touring bars, whore-houses, rodeos and clubs. They name-change
to ‘Lucky Wray & The Lazy Pine Wranglers’
for some AM radio, and to play back-up for visiting
C&W stars. They cut some country songs too, as ‘Lucky
Wray & The Palomino Ranch Hands’ in 1955, and
older brother Vernon cuts some sides as ‘Ray Vernon’.
Then, while doing his two-year military service in the
Korean War, Link contracts tuberculosis, he’s
coughing up blood. In the resulting surgery he loses a
lung and doctors confidently predict he’ll never be
able to sing again. What the hell do they know?
With Link home again, the group name-switches to the Ray-Men
for a family move to Washington DC, and to neatly jump
the Rock ‘n’ Roll juggernaut, supporting the
likes of Fats Domino, Gene Vincent, Ricky Nelson…
and Crash Craddock! Link’s a big man, with a
monumental greaser Brylcreem slick-back quiff - although
his later sleeve-shots will show him tanned and deeply-lined
with gaunt Indian cheekbones and long raven-black hair.
With typical ingenuity he confides it’s his lack
of musical ability that forces him to contrive and
invent sounds. Ripping holes in his amps’ tweeters
with his knife and grinding smouldering slugs of sound up
and down the fretboard, creating thundering breaks later
to be known as the power-chord. ‘I was looking for
something Chet Atkins wasn’t doing, that all the
jazz kings wasn’t doing. I was looking for my own
sound.’ To journalist Max Bell the resulting
dischord was ‘that near fatal collision between
metal and rockabilly’ (‘Vox’ May
1993).
One night, as house-band for TV’s ‘The
Milt Grant Show’ (on WTTG, Channel 5)
and its spin-off live ‘Record Hops’, the Ray-Men
find themselves backing Doo-Wop hit-makers The Diamond (“Little
Darlin’”). They’re instructed to play the
headliners’ single “The Stroll” - ‘I
don’t know no stroll’ protests Link, but picks
up on Doug’s improvised drum-beat, and what
spontaneously emerges shimmers it way into Rock ‘n’
Roll history. This is what will become “Rumble”.
Cadence is a small indie label formed in Washington DC in
1953 by Archie Bleyer, best known for its seven Nashville-based
million-sellers by the Everly Brothers. The story is,
Archie at first declines to issue the tape they’ve
made of what they originally call “Oddball”,
until he overhears his teenage daughter raving about the
instrumental demo. She says its harsh jagged malevolence
remind her of the ‘rumble’ gang-fight sequence
in ‘West Side Story’,
so Archie retitles it “Rumble”. Those ‘rumble’
associations, with switch-blade juvenile delinquency as
disreputable then as Hip-Hop’s ‘Gangsta’
notoriety is now, results in some disapproving radio bans
on the grounds of inciting teenage violence, but it also
propels it high into the chart. Entering the US Hot
Hundred 12th May 1958 on a big brittle pizza-size 78rpm,
it peaks at no.16 and stays listed for ten weeks.
This first Rock ‘n’ Roll wave sees itself as a
music for the generationally dispossessed. The outcasts,
no-goodniks and social misfits. And its ingredients are
as ethnically diverse as the American ‘melting pot’
can devise. Black ‘Race Records’, Jump and
R&B obviously. Fused to the music of the hillbilly
‘trailer trash’ and rural ‘poor white’.
Plus the Italian-American hoodlums and Doo-Wop street-gang
delinquents. And Hispanics like Ritchie Valens. But there
can be no ethnic group more dispossessed than
the Native Americans. And they are there too. Marvin
Rainwater, a full-blooded Cherokee from Wichita, Kansas
might peak no higher than no.60 on the US ‘Billboard’
chart, but his devastatingly echo-drenched
“Whole Lotta Woman” takes it all the way to the
UK no.1 slot 25th April 1958, and he hangs around long
enough to leave an indelible mark on the rocking decade.
It’s said that in amongst Link’s poorly-documented
session-work there were studio cross-overs, a likelihood
improved by the fact that Link’s brother takes
production-credits for Marvin’s follow-up “Hey
Good Looking”.
If post-war jazz is all about startling dexterity and
virtuoso improvisational skills, Rock ‘n’ Roll
- the bastard offspring of R&B and C&W, has got
to be its polar opposite. Instinctively it’s
suspicious of basic proficiency, never mind virtuosity,
which is why seventies Prog-Rock strains the limits of
what’s considered acceptable, why Dire Straits are
suspect, not despite but because of
their abilities and articulate ambition. Rock has always
been more a Folk-thing valuing pick-up musical illiteracy
and the inspired three-chord accident. But that’s
only half the story. From explosive energy and
undisciplined spontaneity can come a purity undiluted by
premeditation, unhampered by intellect. An earthy
visceral howl. An unfiltered connection from urge to
expression, by-passing language and preconception. By
bursting through frustration and incoherence, at rare
moments, it can achieve levels of pure expression. A
sonic assault on all that’s inexpressible. It
happens rarely. An unstable combination of unpredictable
elements. But when it does, its effects can be seismic.
All its classic statements, from Elvis and Gene Vincent,
through the Sex Pistols and Ramones, via the Who are
about that mysterious alchemy of the moment that things
come unexpectedly together. Link Wray stumbles into one
of its purest expressions, summoning spectres and talking
in tongues. He does it once. But that’s enough. Such
moments are quintessential. It’s not so much that he
broke the rules, as that he didn’t know the rules
were there in the first place. There’s no real logic
in gouging and busting open your 40-watt speaker
cabinets, it’s more a kind of raw intuition. The
resulting burn of kicked-in Les Paul fuzztone distortion,
fretboard scrape and wang-bar overload sounds right.
Strings resonate and squeal over floorboard-stomping
rhythms, with a tin-full of nails to add cymbal-FX. And
it’s indefinably right. No way to quantify or
rationalise it down. He certainly never did. But once it
comes roaring out from what’s left of the battered
amp he knows he’s found whatever it is he
needs. An exact analogue of Dave Davies’ galvanic
amp-demolition for the neolithic “You Really Got Me”
riff. To Pete Townshend’s frustrated auto-destruction.
Or Jimi Hendrix triggering squalls of techno-primitive
feedback. Chances are you don’t know what you’re
looking for, until you find it. It can be hoodlum dumb.
But it is also egalitarian. It doesn’t have to be
dumb. It also has gene-traces of both Robert Johnson and
Woody Guthrie. So it can be smart and cunning. Bob Dylan
or Ray Davies. But “Rumble” heads more for the
heart than the head, it is primal wordless expression, so
crude it hurts. And - by accident or intuitive design, it
is a decade ahead of its time.
‘JACK
THE RIPPER… AND BEYOND…’
When Archie Bleyer
unwisely advises Link to ‘clean up his act’,
Link - never less than restlessly unpredictable, ups and
signs to Epic. But, despite a further hit with “Rawhide”
- which enters the US chart 16th March 1959, peaking at
no.23 and spending just three weeks listed, they also try
neutering his style by steering him towards recording
mainstream standards, when his real genius lies in
creating some of the rawest crudest ear-trembling sounds
ever recorded - “Ace Of Spades”, “Comanche”
or “Run Chicken Run”. After leaving Epic, Link
and his brothers set to converting their family chicken-coop
out back of their trailer-home in arid Accokeek, twelve
miles from Tucson Arizona, into a rudimentary recording
studio from which they can unleash more wild
instrumentals, with the background sound of croaking
bullfrogs occasionally audible way back in the Ampex mix.
They briefly form their own ‘Rumble Records’ to
issue three singles - including the instrumental “Jack
The Ripper” (1963). Allegedly recorded on a hotel
staircase to achieve the correct echo, it gets picked up
by Bernie Bennink and Tony Mamarella of Philadelphia’s
Swan Records, and goes on to provide the Ray-Men with a
final chart hit. Swan encourages a relative studio
freedom Link’s other major-label encounters have
denied, and his years with them prove innovative (until
the label goes into liquidation in 1965). He formulates
tremolo effects activated by turning a knob on his
Premier amp, with occasional vocal-shots too against
medical advice - sometimes modulated by hooking it
through his garden hose. But despite touring the East
Coast, doing TV’s legendary ‘Dick
Clark Show’, while recording a wealth
of low-fi material over the next five years for other
labels, including Alpine, there will be no more hits.
Lack of funds and poor health conspire against him. Yet
despite barely scraping a living he continues as an
obscurely prolific one-man social disturbance, in his own
niche corner, across every decade since. Creating music
that is subject to no pressures other than the need to
play. He, and the Ray-Men, who at various times number
Doug, Ed Cynar - who replaces Shorty Horton in 1964,
Elwood Brown, Johnny Sneed and Chuck Bennett. With Link
self-producing his brooding reverberating screwball
excursions up the fretboard in scorching blasts of
adrenalin.
His mainstream success had always been slight and
frequently-interrupted, and then - for the greater part
of the next decade, Wray drops from the major label scene
entirely. First overtaken by the cleaner distortion-free
guitar sound of the Ventures, and by the Duane Eddy
‘Twang’, then by the English vocal-group
invasion that overnight renders the Ray-Men’s style
obsolete. Ironically so, as it’s John Lennon, the
Who, Jeff Beck, and Marc Bolan who are among his
staunchest and most verbal admirers. Yet it’s
precisely Link’s dogged adherence to his primal
garage sound, despite changing trends, that guarantees
him the minor but secure cult following that keeps him
working, until it eventually full-circles back into
currency. And it’s this underground word-of-mouth
reputation, fuelled by gushing references to his work in
interviews by these new Rock gods, that reaches the
attention of English record execs, who issue the gutsily
uneven ‘Link Wray’
through Polydor in 1971, and the more Country-Rock ‘Be
What You Want To’ with its guest
superstar sidesmen soon after. Link goes on to tour and
cut two well-received albums with retro-rockabilly
throwback Robert Gordon, only to resurface with Virgin
for the rough-cut country-blues of ‘Beans
And Fatback’. Although each of these
albums has something to recommend them, it’s also
true that - just because big-label money is involved,
Link is never tempted to raise his game, and sees no need
to alter his working methods. He enjoys his ripple of
late-recognition without ever taking it too seriously or
feeling he has anything to prove, or live up to. He plays
and records as he’s always done, warts and all. But
this renewed interest, alongside sporadic rockabilly
revivals, and energetic evangelists such as Robert Gordon
and the Cramps, creates a ready market for new
compilations and CD reissues of rare and previously
unavailable recordings from various lost back-catalogues.
And Europe opens up a new audience for him, right through
his final years. As devotee and website-host Greg Laxton
points out ‘Punk-rock, Grunge, Garage, Heavy Metal
and ‘rock guitar’ in general… they can all
trace their roots to Link Wray… in 1958 you could
buy “Rumble” on a 78rpm record. In 2005 you can
buy the Link documentary ‘The Rumble Man’
on DVD.’
Meanwhile, brother Vernon moves west to Arizona, slicing
off the back-wall of the chicken-shed studio, and taking
it with him as a base for a reconstructed ‘Wray’s
Shack 3 Tracks’. Kris Kristofferson, among others,
record there. Brother Doug stays on in Waldorf Maryland,
a businessman by day playing solo gigs in local clubs.
While Link himself marries a Danish student of Native
American culture - Olive Julie Povlsen, in 1979 (supposedly
his third marriage, with some eight or nine children),
and the following year they settle on an island off the
coast of Copenhagen with their son Oliver. With Olive
functioning as his manager, and a blitz of movies
cinematically soundtracking his music, such as Richard
Gere’s ‘Breathless’ (1983,
which included his “Jack The Ripper”), ‘Confessions
Of A Dangerous Mind’ (George Clooney’s
movie featuring “The Swag”), ‘Pulp
Fiction’ (joining other manic guitar
legend Dick Dale on the soundtrack), ‘Johnny
Suede’ (with Brad Pitt), and Sci-Fi
blockbuster ‘Independence Day’.
These last fifteen years ensure the man who launched a
thousand buzz-saw guitars enjoys a higher profile than at
any other time since the birth of “Rumble”. The
man who time-warped the guitar by sneaking proto-Heavy
Metal into the fifties, tours regularly - and vigorously,
across Europe and back in the States. Never less than
authentic. Always real. Until he’s finally stopped
by heart failure, aged 76. He dies at his home in
Copenhagen, on Tuesday 5th November 2005.
© Copyright Andrew Darlington.
FEATURE BY
ANDREW DARLINGTON
‘LINK BY
LINK: THE ALBUMS…’
Singles:
May 1958 “Rumble” c/w “The Swag” (Cadence
1347)
March 1959 “Rawhide” c/w “Dixie Doodle”
(Epic 9300)
August 1960 “Jack The Ripper” c/w “The
Black Widow” (Swan)
Other sought-after Swan singles includes “Branded”/“Hang
On”, “Deuces Wild”/“Summer Dream”,
“Batman Theme” (with goonish voice-effects)/
“Alone”, “Ace Of Spades”/”Hidden
Charms”, “You Hurt Me So”/”Girl From
North Country” (Dylan song)
January 1964 “The Sweeper” c/w “Weekend”
(Swan)
February 1964 “Mr Guitar”, “Dinosaur”,
“Rumble”, “Run Chicken Run” (Swan EP)
“Big City Stomp” c/w “Poppin’ Popeye”
(Trans-Atlas label)
March 1978 “Batman” c/w “Hidden Charms”
(Chiswick)
plus “Little Shoes” c/w “Down In The Mine”
by The Wray Family (Lawn label)
Albums:
‘MISSING LINK SERIES’ compiled
from rare acetates by US Indie Norton label ‘Vol.1
Hillbilly Wolf’ (ED210) collecting the
Rockabilly roots of ‘Lucky Wray & The Palomino
Ranch Gang’ through the earliest
Ray-Men, with “Teenage Cutie” ( from US Starday
label), “I Sez Baby” (Link’s first
recorded vocal, a 1955 Kay label single), “Johnny
Bom Bonnie”, “Pancho Villa”, “Hillbilly
Wolf”, “Flirty Baby”, “Danger One Way
Love Ahead” etc, ‘Vol.2 Big City
After Dark’ (ED211) includes six live
cuts circa 1961, with “Big City After Dark”,
“The Bad & The Good”, “Big City Stomp”,
“Rumble Rock”, “Hold It”, “The
Stranger” etc, ‘Vol.3 Some Kinda
Nut’ (ED212) Link & The Ray-Men
with early and mid-60’s rarities, “Baby Doll”,
“Run Boy Run”, “Growling Guts”,
“Drag Strip”, “Hungry Child”, “Genocide”
etc. Their 63-track ‘Mr Guitar’ set
compiles material from all four. There’s also a
highly collectible single “Vendetta” (early
sixties) c/w “Facin All The Same Tomorrows” (1965
vocal demo)(45-003) and mini-LP ‘The
Junior Raymen: Rumble 66’ (Norton ED213)
by nephew Vern (who died soon after) with his teen combo,
produced by Vernon Wray with “I’m Branded”,
“Ace Of Spades”, “The Rat Fink”,
“Jack The Ripper”, “Rumble ‘66”
‘WALKIN’ WITH LINK’ (Sony CD4728662)
20-tracks from Epic period with “Slinky”,
“Ramble”, “Hand Clapper”, “Rawhide”,
“Dixie Doodle”, “Studio Blues”,
“Comanche”, “Right Turn”, “Radar”,
“Lillian”, “Dance Contest”, “Guitar
Cha-Cha”, “Rumble Mambo”, “Ain’t
That Lovin’ You Baby” (Jimmy Reed song), “Mary
Anne” (Link vocals on Ray Charles song), “Oh
Babe Be Mine”, “New Studio Blues”, “Walkin’
With Link” (reissued May 1993 Epic CD)
‘LINK WRAY & THE RAYMEN’ (Originally
Epic LN 3661 USA - 1959, Edsel ED149 - 1985) tracks drawn
from the Epic archive with “Dixie-Doodle” (with
Duane Eddy-style ‘rebel yells’), “Ramble”,
“Caroline”, “Rawhide”, “Right
Turn”, “Golden Strings”, “Comanche”,
“Hambone” (tribute to Link’s earliest
guitar tutor), “Mary Ann”, “Rumble Mambo”,
“Ain’t That Loving You Baby”, “Slinky”,
“Hand Clapper”, “Lillian”, “Radar”,
“Studio Blues” (also issued under the title ‘Rockin’
And Handclappin’)
‘GROWLING GUITAR’ (Big Beat/ Ace WIK65
- September 1987) tracks from the Swan catalogue, with
“Climbing A High Wall” (‘a one-take
monster of a recording’ says ‘Record Collector
168’, using wah-wah pedal), “Genocide”,
“The Earth Is Crying”, “Growling Guts”,
“Hungry”, “Ace Of Spades ‘69”,
“Ruby Baby”, “Hang On”, “Summer
Dreams”, “Sorrento”, “Peggy Sue”,
“Alone”, “Girl From The North Country”,
“You Hurt Me So”, “The Fuzz” (re-issued
May 1991 with bonus ‘Live In ‘85’
tracks)
‘JACK THE RIPPER’ (Swan SLP 510 USA -
1963, reissue Line LLP5187, Germany - 1982, Hangman June
1990) with “Mr Guitar”, “My Beth”,
“Deacon Jones”, “Steel Trap”, “Cross
Ties”, “Jack The Ripper”, “Ace Of
Spades”, “Hidden Charms”, “Fat Back”,
“Run Chicken Run”, “Dinosaur”, “Big
Ben”, “Mash Potato Party”, “I’ll
Do Anything For You”, “Rendez-Vous”,
“Slinky”
‘THERE’S GOOD ROCKIN’ TONIGHT’ (Union
Pacific UP002 - August 1973, Ace CH69 - 1982) 17 tracks
from Cadence, Epic and Swan from 1957-1965 compiled by
Union Pacific label-boss Ian Sippen who died in 1973,
with the original “Rumble”, its B-side “The
Swag” from Cadence (1958), plus 13 1963/4 sides from
Swan Records, “Deuces Wild”, “Mustang”,
“Heartbreak Hotel”, “Law Of The Jungle”,
“Blueberry Hill” “Run Boy Run”,
“Honky Tonk”, “The Sweeper”, “Hound
Dog”, “That’ll Be The Day”, “Zip
Code”, “Scatter”, “El Toro”,
“Tijuana”, “Rumble Mambo”, “Jack
The Ripper”, “Black Widow”, “Good
Rockin’ Tonight” (vocal version of Roy Brown
hit), “Batman Theme”, “I’m Branded”,
“Hang On”, “Ace Of Spades”, “Alone”,
also re-issued as ‘Rock ‘n’
Roll Rumble’ (Charly CR30171 - 1979)
‘LINK WRAY: THE EARLY RECORDINGS’ (Chiswick/
Ace CH6 - 1978)14 tracks from 1963-’65, with “Batman
Theme”, “Ace Of Spades”, “Cross Ties”,
“Jack The Ripper”, “Hidden Charms” (vocal
version of Willie Dixon song), “I’m Branded”,
“The Shadow Knows”, “Fat Back”,
“Run Chicken Run”, “Black Widow”,
“Scatter”, “Turnpike USA”, “Mr
Guitar”, “Rumble”. ‘Apart from Bo
Diddley, no contemporary of Wray’s ever coaxed
meaner, nastier noises out of a guitar’ writes
Charles Shaar Murray (‘NME’ 6 May 1978)
‘GREAT GUITAR HITS OF LINK WRAY & THE RAYMEN’
(Vermillion LP1924 USA - 1967) + ‘Link
Wray Sings & Plays Guitar’ (Vermillion
LP1925 USA - 1968)
‘YESTERDAY & TODAY’ (Record
Factory LP1929 USA - 1969)
‘LINK WRAY’ (Polydor 24-4064 -
August 1971) produced and part co-written with Steve
Verroca, with Billy ‘Juke Box’ Hodges pno,
Bobby Howard mandolin, Doug Wray drs, and Link gtr,
dobro, bass, vocals, includes the single “Fire &
Brimstone” c/w “Juke-Box Mama” plus “Take
Me Home Jesus”, “Black River Swamp”,
“The Rise & Fall Of Jimmy Stokes”, “La
de da”, “Fallin’ Rain”, “Ice
People”, “God Out West”, “Crowbar”,
“Tail Dragger”. Richard Williams writes ‘this
is probably the ultimate down-home album, recorded on the
little three-track machinery in Wray’s Shack’ (‘Melody
Maker’)
‘MORDICAI JONES’ (Polydor PD5010
- 1971) Mandolin player on Link’s ‘Beans &
Fatback’ solo album, with Link Wray participation
‘BE WHAT YOU WANT TO’ (Polydor
PD5047 - 1973, reissued on CD 2005) in country-Rock
style, recorded in California, with Jerry Garcia,
Jefferson Airplane’s Peter Kaukonen, Commander Cody
and others guesting, produced by Thom Jefferson-Kaye,
includes the single “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” c/w
“Shine The Light” plus “Be What You Want
To”, “All Cried Out”, “Tucson Arizona”,
“Riverbed”, “You Walked By”, “Walk
Easy Walk Slow”, “All The Love In My Life”,
“You Really Got A Hold On Me”, “Morning”
‘BEANS AND FATBACK’ (Virgin V2006
- October 1973) produced and all co-written with Steve
Verroca but for traditional “Georgia Pines” and
“Take My Hand”, recorded at ‘The Shack,
USA’, includes the single “I’m So Glad”
c/w “Shawnee Tribe” plus “Water Boy”,
“Beans & Fatback”, “Hobo Man”,
“Alabama Circus”, “From Tulsa To North
Carolina”, “Right Or Wrong”, “In The
Pines”. ‘A fine album… as raw as chapped
legs, as grizzly as a brown bear, its spirit is strong,
its flesh barely covers its white-hard bone’ (Geoff
Brown ‘Melody Maker’)
‘THE LINK WRAY RUMBLE’ (Polydor
2391128 - 1974) with Pete Townshend liner notes. Tracks
later compiled on 1996 ‘Guitar Preacher:
The Polydor Years’ (Polydor 527 717-2)
‘STUCK IN GEAR’ (Virgin V2050
- March 1976) Link’s first UK-recorded album, eight
tracks including a version of “Jack The Ripper”
caught live at the London Lyceum, plus “Southern
Lady”, “Tecolote”, “Quicksand”,
“I Know You’re Leaving Me Now”, “Did
You See The Man”, “Midnight Lover”, “Cottoncandy
Apples”, “Bo Jack”
‘ROBERT GORDON WITH LINK WRAY’ (Private
Stock PS2030 - August 1977) one of two album
collaborations, features The Wildcats (Billy Cross gtr,
Rob Stoner - formerly of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder
bass, Howie Wyeth drs, Charlie Messing gtr). Richard
Gottehrer - formerly of 60’s Strangeloves pno &
production. Recorded at Plaza Sound NY, includes the
single “Red Hot” c/w “Sweet Surrender”
plus “Flying Saucers Rock ‘n’ Roll” (the
Billy Lee Riley hit, as is ‘Red Hot’), “I
Sure Miss You”, “Lit’s In The Bottle”,
“Woman”, “Is This The Way”, “Summertime
Blues”, “The Fool”, “Boppin’ The
Blues” (Carl Perkins). The other Robert Gordon
collaboration is ‘FRESH FISH SPECIAL’ (Private
Stock Records PVLP1038 - 1978) includes the singles
“Fire” c/w “If This Is Wrong” and
“The Way I Walk” c/w “Sea Cruise”
plus “Red Cadillac And A Black Moustache”,
“Five Days”, “I Want To Be Free”,
“Twenty Flight Rock”, “Lonesome Train”,
“Blue Eyes”
‘THE GUITAR ALBUM’ (Polydor
2482382 - 1977) compilation includes Link doing Willie
Dixon’s “Tail Dagger”
‘BULLSHOT’ (Charisma CAR 1143
/Visa Records - June 1979) with Alpha Band stalwarts Rob
Stoner bass, Howie Wyeth drs, Billy Cross rhythm, Anton
Fig drs, Chris Robinson keys, plus producer Gottehrer,
includes single “It’s All Over Now Baby Blue”
(Dylan song) c/w “Just That Kind Of Switchblade”
(instrumental), plus “Fever”, “Good Good
Lovin’”, “Rawhide”, “Snag”,
“Wild Party”, “Don’t” (originally
done as a demo guide-track for Robert Gordon), “The
Sky Is Falling”
‘LIVE AT THE PARADISO’ (Passport
PB2014, Canada - 1980, Europe-only CD, Visa 7010 USA -
1980) with Anton Fig drs, Jimmy Lowell bass, including
“Blue Suede Shoes”, “Ace Of Spades”,
“Walk Away From Love”, “I Saw Her Standing
There”, “Run Chicken Run”, “She’s
No Good”, “Rumble”, “Rawhide”,
“Subway Blues”, “Money”, “Shake
Rattle & Roll”, Bebop A Lula”
‘LINK WRAY: LIVE IN ‘85’ (Big
Beat WIKM42 - 1986) recorded during a US tour through
January and February with Keith Lentin bass, Marty Feier
drs, including his final gig in the Washington DC area -
at the ‘Wax Museum’ with “Rumble”,
“It’s Only Words”, “Fire”,
“Mystery Train/ I Got A Woman/ Baby Let’s Play
House”, “Jack The Ripper”, “Love Me”,
“King Creole”, “I’m Counting On You”,
“Rawhide”, “Born To Be Wild”, re-issued
as 2-for-1 with ‘GROWLING GUITAR’
as Ace CDWIK972
‘BORN TO BE WILD: LIVE 1987’ (CD
- 1987)
‘LINK WRAY: THE RUMBLE MAN’ (Ace
CH266 - 1988) recorded in one night for Ace’s Ted
Carroll, with “Draggin’”, “Bull Dawg”,
“Aces Wild”, “Street Beat”, “Honest,
I Swear Somebody Lied”, “The Rumble Man”,
“I’m Gonna Sit Right Down And Cry”, “Big
City Walk”, “I Will Be Home Again”, “Copenhagen
Boogie”, “The Thrill Of Your Love”
‘THE ORIGINAL RUMBLE + 22 OTHER
INSTRUMENTALS’ (Ace CDCH924 - 1989) 23
thunderous guitar instrumentals, including “Rumble”,
“The Swag”, “Batman (Theme)”, “Ace
Of Spades”, “Jack The Ripper”, “I’m
Branded”, “Fat Back”, “Run Chicken
Run”, “Turnpike USA”, “Deuces Wild”,
“Mustang”, “Blueberry Hill”, “Run
Boy Run”, “The Sweeper”, “Hound Dog”,
“That’ll Be The Day”, “The Fuzz”,
“Rawhide”, “Draggin’”, “Aces
Wild”, “Bull Dawg”, “The Rumble Man”,
“Copenhagen Boogie”
‘APACHE: WILD SIDE OF THE CITY LIGHTS’ (Ace
CDCHD931 - 1989) two complete 1989 albums, + bonus track,
includes Link’s raw take on the Jerry Lordan-penned
Shadows’ hit, plus vocals “Big Boss Man”
and “Beautiful Brown Eyes”, plus “The Wild
One”, “Dallas Blues”, “Shawnee”,
“The Joker”, “Stars & Stripes Forever”,
“Green Hornet”, “Dick Tracy Private Eye”,
“Hotel Loneliness”, “Raunchy”, “The
Flying Wedge” (a homage to drag-racing), “Don’t
Leave Me”, “American Sunset”, “Little
Sister”, “Love Me Tender”, “Wild Side
Of The City Lights”, “Viva Zapata”, “As
Long As I Have You”, “Street Beat” With
Bruce Brand (harmonica and drums). Produced by Wray
‘INDIAN CHILD’ (May 1993 Sony
Denmark EPC473100 Europe-only CD/ imported by Ball
Products, a Creation affiliate) ten tracks includes two
recorded for a 1985 MTV-special, “Rumble” and
the vocal “Trying To Find Your Love”, plus
others recorded with Danish backing band Shaky Ground (Kim
Hyttel keys, Flemming Nilsson percussion, Jan Mols
rhythm, Carsten Egholm bass, Erik Lodberg drs), with
“It Was Elvis” (vocal, ‘I wrote ‘It
Was Elvis’ because the kids only remember the fat
Vegas Elvis who died. That’s not Elvis. This is
Elvis, the young Elvis, the progressive Elvis, the Sid
Vicious Elvis, the boy with guts’ he tells ‘Record
Collector’ August 1993), plus “Torture”,
“Guitar-Man From New Orleans”, “God’s
Little Baby”, “Indian Child”, “Saving
All My Love”, “Bring On The Night”, “I
Apologise”, “Diamonds & Pearls”. Some
lyrics by wife Olive. As ‘Neanderthal as anything
that ever crawled out of a swamp’ says ‘Vox’
‘WALKING DOWN A STREET CALLED LOVE’ (1996
- Cherry Red/ Visionary) live set with tribute-to-Elvis
medley, “Jailhouse Rock/ Young And Beautiful”,
issued with the video ‘RUMBLEMAN’
‘SHADOWMAN’ (Ace CDCHD638 - 1997) with
“Timewarp” (a souped-up version of “Rawhide”),
“I Can’t Help It” (vocal on Hank Williams
song), plus savage instrumentals
‘BARBED WIRE’ (Ace Records - 2000 CD)
Link ‘unplugged’, acoustic guitar and vocals
‘SLINKY: THE COMPLETE EPIC SESSIONS’ (2004
double-CD compilation)
‘THE SWAN SINGLES COLLECTION’ (2004 CD
compilation)
‘RUMBLE: THE BEST OF LINK WRAY’ (CD -
Japan)
‘DAVE DUDLEY WITH SPECIAL GUESTS LINK WRAY & THE
RAY-MEN’
‘RUMBLE RECORDS Vol.1’ + ‘RUMBLE RECORDS
Vol.2’
Link Wray material can also be heard on the soundtrack of
‘Desperado’, ‘Twelve
Monkeys’, ‘This Boy’s
Life’, ‘Blow’…
and ‘Taco Bell’ TV-ads.
While the ‘Wray Collective’, and Link himself
were involved in recording “Hide & Go Seek”,
a 1962 US Top 40 solo hit for ‘Bunker Hill’ aka
David Walker of the Mighty Clouds Of Joy, for 1955 RCA
sides by Dick Williams, and some seventy other singles (including
‘Ray Vernon’s 1957 Cameo-label version of
“Remember You’re Mine”, covered into the
charts by Pat Boone) , as well as an A&M album by
avant-garde band Eggs Over Easy…
with discographical thanks to:-
http://www.wraysshack3tracks.com/linkdisco.html
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