The Roses

The Roses (Odessa, Texas)



Personnel :

Robert Linville (Tenor)

Ray Rush (Baritone)

David Bigham (Bass)




Discography :

The Roses
1958 - Almost Paradise / I Kissed an angel (Dot 15816)
1958 - Rock Me My Baby (Dot) (Unreleased)

Don (Lanier) & The Roses
1958 - Right Now / Since You Went Away To School (Dot 15755)
1958 - Leave Those Cats Alone  / Don't Try To Change Me (Dot 15874)
1958 - Tease (Dot) (Unreleased)



Biography :

The group hailed from the towns of Andrews & Odessa, TX & had originally backed up Roy Orbison on his Sun recordings. Being that Roy used the Clovis studios, it was through him that they were introduced to Norman Petty & became session vocalists there for many years.

Replacing The Picks, they were used as the backing group for Buddy & The Crickets' recordings for most of 1958. They appeared on: Think It Over, Fool's Paradise, Lonesome Tears, & It's So Easy. They also did backups on JI's recordings as "Ivan" of "Real Wild Child", "Frankie Frankenstein" & "That'll Be Alright".They sang "Real Wild Child" with JI (Ivan) at the recording in 1958, and not again until the Surf Tribute in February 1999. "I forgot how that one went!" said David.

   
The Roses                                                                 Don & The Roses

They also did late'58 recordings with The Crickets after Buddy left for New York as well as appearing on recordings with Buddy Knox, Waylon Jennings, Jimmy Bowen, Bobby Vee & many more Petty Studio recordings during 1958-1959. So many in fact that Robert & David assume they recorded approx. 150 tracks (they were recording multiple sessions per day!) and they have not been able to keep track of all of their recordings.

As "The Roses" they recorded 3 singles on the Dot label, two as Don (Lanier) & The Roses, and one as simply "The Roses", being Norman Petty's "Almost Paradise" composition.
The Roses were the only group to actually tour with Buddy & The Crickets as backup vocalists for 16 days of the fall edition of Alan Freed's Show Of Stars 1958. Near the end of that tour was the last time Robert & David saw Ray Rush. "Ray was late for EVERYTHING. The shows, when we had to leave, recording sessions...everything. We warned him that the next time we were ready to leave town, we were leaving at 9:00 sharp. A minute later & we would be gone without him. Well, 9:00 hit & no Ray around. So we left, and we never saw Ray again!" Robert muses.

http://www.buddyhollyandthecrickets.com/related/roses.html
http://www.rockabillyhall.com/TheRoses1.html

Songs :

   
I Kissed an angel                            Almost Paradise