From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Thu May 2, 2002  1:14 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Link Wray
 
LINK WRAY (By Shaun Mather)

Born 2 May 1935, Dunn, North Carolina

The king of the power chord, the rumbler with the swagger, Link Wray is a
guitar hero whose influence has not been fully appreciated - yet! He'll
have to die to get that I suppose. They say that kids kept their Pat Boone
singles on the dresser table whilst their Little Richard ones were under the
bed where mom and pop couldn't see them - the same might be true of Duane
Eddy and Link Wray. His early years saw him playing with his brothers Doug
and Vernon (Lucky) most notably for Starday and Kay. After being advised
not to sing because of a missing lung, he started experimenting with his
axe, the results of which were seen when Cadence became the unlikely label
to issue the menacing instrumental Rumble, which went to # 16 on the charts
in 1958. Not wanting to toe the party line and tone down the sound, Wray and
the band (now called the Ray-Men) quit Cadence and moved to Epic and
immediately went to # 23 with the follow-up, Rawhide. Epic then covered him
in strings (e.g. Danny Boy) and he moved on again, this time to his own
label, Rumble Records, for whom he issued three singles. One of them, Jack
The Ripper was eventually picked up by Swan Records who allowed the band to
blast away for the next few years. Through the '60s he recorded to various
labels but was unable to hit the charts. The '70s saw him forming a deadly
combination with retro-rockabilly Robert Gordon. Recent times have seen him
produce the odd album as well as playing all too infrequent gigs to sell out
Europe crowds. He currently resides in Denmark, desperately seeking a
hairdresser.

Recommended listening:
Early Recordings - Ace
Rumble! The Best of Link Wray - Rhino
Missing Links Vols 1-4 - Norton