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Five Legends, Five Guitars: How The Traveling Wilburys Recorded an Album "Super" Fast
In 1988, five music legends wrote and recorded an album in ten days. How? They used their superpowers from an alternate universe, of course.In this blend of fact and fiction, learn how Lucky had become the world's greatest songwriter and why Otis was the go-to music producer of the 1980s and 1990s. See Lefty redeem his gift just before his early, tragic death. Nelson and Charlie T. Jnr. kept the rest on track with their psychic powers.These musical heroes bear a striking resemblance to The Traveling George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, and Jeff Lynne in our universe, but they aren't the same people. Or are they?
302 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 17, 2018
3 people are currently reading
7 people want to read
About the author
Pam Van Allen
19 books9 followersPam Van Allen is a retired psychologist living in Northern California. She enjoys writing, drawing, and music, especially the Electric Light Orchestra. That’s Jeff Lynne in the background performing at Wembley in the UK.
Dr. Van Allen grew up in the Southern United States. She obtained her doctoral degree from the University of Memphis. She practiced in Memphis for almost 20 years before realizing California was the place to be and moved to Stockton to work for Kaiser Permanente.
Besides writing, Dr. Van Allen also rescues cats. She lives with one she rescued named “Tasha.” Her pet peeve is people thinking her last name is “Allen” rather than “Van Allen.”
Dr. Van Allen grew up in the Southern United States. She obtained her doctoral degree from the University of Memphis. She practiced in Memphis for almost 20 years before realizing California was the place to be and moved to Stockton to work for Kaiser Permanente.
Besides writing, Dr. Van Allen also rescues cats. She lives with one she rescued named “Tasha.” Her pet peeve is people thinking her last name is “Allen” rather than “Van Allen.”
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
December 28, 2021
I heard about this book on a podcast about the Wilburys and thought it might be a fun read. I wasn't entirely sure what to expect, but I was very pleasantly surprised! I've seen The True History Of The Traveling Wilburys documentary and read several articles about what those ten days of recording were like, but it was so much fun to read a detailed story of how it could have gone, even if it was a fictional telling of the story.
The conversations and friendships among the Wilburys were so sweet and warm and generally lovely, and I loved seeing how they interacted with each other. Their superpowers were also fascinating. I'd worried that the superpowers would feel cheesy to me, but I ended up loving it. The mental image of (probably not a spoiler, but tagging it in case) is hilarious and adorable. Charlie T. Jnr. and confusing the crap out of everyone with it is great. Nelson using his powers to . I'd believe it if Lucky and Otis have their superpowers in this universe too. Also I would die for Otis. But I digress...
My biggest criticism of the book is about how the facts and fiction were weaved together. When it was written as part of the narrative it flowed fine, but when facts were dropped into the dialogue, it sometimes felt forced and unnatural, not like how close friends would tell each other about their own lives.
All in all, I truly adored this - and my Wilbury-loving friends can attest to this, since I dropped at least a dozen photos of my favorite moments into the group chat. I'm sure I'll reread this little thing in the future. Reading it just made me feel very happy.
To quote the book's goal: "The foremost reason I wrote this book was to capture the spirit of fun and camaraderie the five friends enjoyed as they created music together." As far as I'm concerned, this was very successful. Well done, Ms. Mavis Wilbury.
The conversations and friendships among the Wilburys were so sweet and warm and generally lovely, and I loved seeing how they interacted with each other. Their superpowers were also fascinating. I'd worried that the superpowers would feel cheesy to me, but I ended up loving it. The mental image of (probably not a spoiler, but tagging it in case) is hilarious and adorable. Charlie T. Jnr. and confusing the crap out of everyone with it is great. Nelson using his powers to . I'd believe it if Lucky and Otis have their superpowers in this universe too. Also I would die for Otis. But I digress...
My biggest criticism of the book is about how the facts and fiction were weaved together. When it was written as part of the narrative it flowed fine, but when facts were dropped into the dialogue, it sometimes felt forced and unnatural, not like how close friends would tell each other about their own lives.
All in all, I truly adored this - and my Wilbury-loving friends can attest to this, since I dropped at least a dozen photos of my favorite moments into the group chat. I'm sure I'll reread this little thing in the future. Reading it just made me feel very happy.
To quote the book's goal: "The foremost reason I wrote this book was to capture the spirit of fun and camaraderie the five friends enjoyed as they created music together." As far as I'm concerned, this was very successful. Well done, Ms. Mavis Wilbury.
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September 17, 2020Being a writer at Billboard Magazine in the early seventies was incredible. Bands like Janis Joplin’s Big Brother and the Holding Company, Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, and the likes were daily visitors at the office. The Beatles had just disbanded and went in different directions. Even Yoko was doing her own thing. I saw her at Kenny’s Castaways on the upper East Side. Andrew Lloyd Weber and Tim Rice were writing Jesus Christ Superstar and sat at the bar of the Castaways. Tim Harden was at the bar and we drank shots of vodka and slipped out to imbibe in illegal substances. It was probably just after this period that George Harrison conjured what was to become the Travelling Wilburys.
By the late 1980s, I was far away from the Billboard scene and was well into ethnic music from all over the world. I didn’t know anything about the Traveling Wilburys, was shocked to learn that Bob Dylan and Roy Orbison were in the same band, but even that did not move me to want to know why such a perversion could come about.
Consequently, I came to the Traveling Wilburys via Pan Van Allen’s great rock ‘n’ roll novel, which immediately demonstrated to me that Van Allen could very well have been a writer at Billboard or Rolling Stone all through the years. Five Legends Five Guitars is a hypothetical self-contained reality co-existing with her own educated view on how five of the greatest musical artists acted in her special universe.
It was George as Nelson, who hung out with Bob Dylan playing Lucky, where they went deep with each other. As soon as you read the exchange you knew the author wrote it herself by some psychedelic direct communication of what really was said. It is represented in Five Legends Five Guitars, but I found it in a short story Pan Van Allen also wrote, Old Brown Shoes. “Bob sat on a rock and watched the pale light encompass his friend as the minutes ticked by. He had no idea how long this process would take for George. He only knew that after he had merged with the brilliant light, his songwriting had improved exponentially, and the songs had come much more easily to him. He thought this was the best gift he could give his friend who had to deal with colleagues who believed they were much superior songwriters.”
Pam Van Allen wrote Five Legends first by falling in love with each and every band-member and then in her unique way, reconstructed them into who the Wilburys had been in a parallel universe where their souls reside.
By the late 1980s, I was far away from the Billboard scene and was well into ethnic music from all over the world. I didn’t know anything about the Traveling Wilburys, was shocked to learn that Bob Dylan and Roy Orbison were in the same band, but even that did not move me to want to know why such a perversion could come about.
Consequently, I came to the Traveling Wilburys via Pan Van Allen’s great rock ‘n’ roll novel, which immediately demonstrated to me that Van Allen could very well have been a writer at Billboard or Rolling Stone all through the years. Five Legends Five Guitars is a hypothetical self-contained reality co-existing with her own educated view on how five of the greatest musical artists acted in her special universe.
It was George as Nelson, who hung out with Bob Dylan playing Lucky, where they went deep with each other. As soon as you read the exchange you knew the author wrote it herself by some psychedelic direct communication of what really was said. It is represented in Five Legends Five Guitars, but I found it in a short story Pan Van Allen also wrote, Old Brown Shoes. “Bob sat on a rock and watched the pale light encompass his friend as the minutes ticked by. He had no idea how long this process would take for George. He only knew that after he had merged with the brilliant light, his songwriting had improved exponentially, and the songs had come much more easily to him. He thought this was the best gift he could give his friend who had to deal with colleagues who believed they were much superior songwriters.”
Pam Van Allen wrote Five Legends first by falling in love with each and every band-member and then in her unique way, reconstructed them into who the Wilburys had been in a parallel universe where their souls reside.
August 18, 2020
Loved this book and I love Jeff Lynne.
June 27, 2019
A very interesting and amusing read about the Traveling Wilburys. The book is full of factual information about the individual artists and their drive to record an album together, but with enough tongue-in-cheek humor and supernatural mayhem that you almost forget the story is based on real people and real music.
January 5, 2020
Outstanding story, I loved this story. The book is a fictional story about the Traveling Wilburys and their superpowers. Fantastic, I loved reading this book and of course I had to listen to their music too, which is fantastic also. Great job by the author, Dr. Pam Van Aleen.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews