>Elvis, Springsteen, Costello, Dylan, Tom Waits, Tom Petty

I don't know about the songwriter part but singer? Absolutely

PRETTY WOMAN

No not greatest songwriter by any means, but he did capture a certain era and feeling, just like elvis and the other contemporaries of the time.

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In Dreams: The Greatest Hits [Virgin, 1987]

From Chuck Berry on Mercury to the reunited Everlys, rerecorded best-ofs like this one rarely deliver magic or chops. The youthful buoyancy that kept the melodrama from getting soggy is in short supply, and without much trade-off in the standard interpretive nuance. A quarter-century later, his voice still socks and soars, and if on some songs--"Pretty Woman" of course, "Blue Bayou," "Candy Man"--it's clear that only the original artyfact will do, nobody who wasn't there would swear to the general inferiority of this marginally more tasteful recreation. After all, just exactly how great were his hits? Crowning him rock's first neurotic is as overwrought as damning Donald Duck for a protofascist--pop-rock (cum countrypolitan) self-pity has its own conventions just like slapstick did, and he is their slave. So as a heretic who isn't positive Phil Spector was good for rock and roll, and also as a heretic who was there, I'll stick with the artyfacts after all. They're certainly no worse. And versions you don't need. B

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>Mangum, Elverum, Costello, Cohen, Kozelek and McCartney all said he was GOAT.

Was he the greatest singer/songwriter of all time? (Hint: yes)

>>69332501
Bruce Springsteen also.

There was one Christgau column where he notes that, although Springsteen likes to cite Elvis and Chuck Berry as his influences, he was a little kid during their heyday. The Boss's teenager years happened a few years later when the Beach Boys, Del Shannon, and Roy Orbison ruled the charts, and his sound really owes more to them than Chuck Berry.

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>Claypool, Reinhart, Hill, Burnett, The Bug and Mexican Girl all said he was GOAT.

Was he the greatest producer/bassist of all time? (Hint: yes)

My mom's cousin used to be obsessed with Roy Orbison back in the day and had all of his records, later she gave my mom all of them. She really didn't like any of RO except In Dreams.

>>69332388
I thought it was Smokey Robinson that Dylan really liked

>>69332388
I never would have known his music if not for his time in the Traveling Wilburys. I've been meaning to look up his body of work. It's so much easier nowadays to do so. I think he certainly appeals to me more than others of his era, though I can't say why just yet, beyond that incredible and unique voice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKHqC9FnA-I

>>69332588
Suit yourself, I don't care for him at all. Also "Oh Pretty Woman" is one of the worst things I've ever heard.

>>69332600
That's one of the few songs I heard as a kid from that era that I really liked a lot. I don't see what there is to hate about it. It's not lyrically deep but his vocals are awesome and the song is so well crafted and timeless.

Any essential albums? Or was he too early for that and a greatest hits will do?

>>69332511
del shannon had like one song lol

granted its a great one but still

>>69332815
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Del_Shannon#Discography.5B16.5D

He had a bunch of hits, but Runaway is the only one that's still played nowadays.

>>69332655
RO's heyday was mostly in the singles era unless you like Traveling Wilburys and some other of his 80s comeback stuff.

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This Is . . . Del Shannon [Music Club, 1997]

The first artist ever to chart Stateside with a Lennon-McCartney song, Shannon is suspended forever in that boy-becomes-man moment when teen-romance tropes unload their frightening burden of existential anxiety. He achieves release with his sole trick, in which minor-key verse gives way to major-key refrain topped by a brief escape into a falsetto that never hints at the feminine. This pop-rock apotheosis he achieved precisely 11 times, which here takes us from "Runaway" to "Stranger in Town." All are also on Rhino's slightly pricier 20-song comp. But where the Rhino filler is all carbon-copy follow-ups and failed experiments, the five bonuses here vary the formula without abandoning it, most memorably on--note title--"I Wish I Wasn't Me Tonight." Despite Nashville forays and a mysteriously forgotten 1968 concept album called The Further Adventures of Charles Westover, he never matured. When he shot himself in 1990 at 55, he was still claiming five years less, just as he had 30 years before. He left no note. Did he have to? A-

>>69332914
Right. See, that kind of proves the point on how Springsteen owes far more to DS and Roy Orbison than 50s Elvis. That insecure teenager in love trope is heavily present in his songs.

>>69332869
This unfortunately. Albums just weren't a big thing at that time but his singles are GOAT.

>>69332388
Maybe not best of all time, but certainly the best of the 50s

>>69332537

It was

>>69332914
nice review

>>69332511
Springsteen has said Born to Run was supposed to sound like a mix of Dylan, Orbison and Phil Spector.

>>69335063
He has good reviews when the subject matter actually interests him.

>>69332511
>roy orbison singing for the lonely
>hey here's me and i want you only
He literally namedrops Roy Orbison on Thunder Road, Christgau is such a hack it's barely conceivable

In Dreams is the best vocal performance in pop music history.

He has more range in one song than most hope to have in their life.

That candy man guy sounds like some pedophile sneaking into a little girl's room at night.

>A candy-colored clown they call the sandman
>Tiptoes to my room every night
>Just to sprinkle star dust and to whisper
>"Go to sleep, everything is alright"

I mean, this is pretty fucking explicit stuff here.

>>69336536
He was good at faintly rapey lyrics.

https://youtu.be/4tt5DE4hbYY

>>69336335

I never did like Springsteen anyway.