Billy Burnette Fans!
 

Any Billy Burnette fans out there? I've added the first three solo albums of Billy's to my blog today, so if anyone is interested, feel free to take a look (and listen).

http://fleetwoodmacmusic.blogspot.com/

Chris

Should there actually be any Billy Burnette fans on here, there are now the following three albums on the blog available for download:

- Gimme You
- Billy Burnette (1980)
- Try Me

http://fleetwoodmacmusic.blogspot.com/

These are in addition to other hard to find Billy albums that are on there:

- Billy Burnette (1972)
- Billy Burnette (1979)
- Between Friends
- Soldier of Love
- Brother to Brother

Enjoy!

I HIGHLY recommend Between Friends. All My Life and Hey You Got Away are classic.

Poor Billy so under-rated. Not sure if there are so many Mac fans on here who are also Billy fans. Almost all of his albums are great - the 1972 one is probably an exception in my opinion.

Billy Burnette? Who is he? :shrug: ;)





Between Friends and Try Me are his best solo albums, IMO. I'll agree that the '72 album isn't great, but it has its moments. Are You With Me Baby is also fantastic as is Bekka and Billy.

His Frog Prince/One Extreme to the Other single from '69 is also pretty awesome (and no, Frog Prince is not one of his worst songs!) as is the Just Another Love Song/Baby single with Jawbone. Actually, I like pretty much everything B.B.'s done.

Incidentally, you've listed Try Me as having been released in 1885. Somehow I don't think the album is quite that old.

Hmm...1885, shows how many years Billy has been around doesn't it... :laugh:

I've fixed that little typo. Just goes to show that typing and alcohol just don't mix.

Well I thought Frog Prince was bad, but then its all a matter of opinion isn't it. He must have been young when he did that song though...

Well, the Penguin bios have his birthdate as 1953. Frog Prince was released in 1969. That would make him 16 years old when it came out.

BTW, I just posted a link to your blog on my Billy site (Billy-Burnette.com). Hope you don't mind.

I've always been partial to his eponymous 1980 album (probably because that was my initiation to Billy Burnette's music)...the one with "Danger Zone" & "Don't Say No". Since "Don't Say No" was a minor hit in 1980, I'm really surprised that it wasn't incorporated into Fleetwood Mac's set at some point during his tenure. The drumbeat on that song just screams "Mick Fleetwood".

Other Billy tunes that Fleetwood Mac should've done live:

Gone Again
Try Me
It Ain't Over
In Just A Heartbeat
Let Your Heart Make Up Your Mind
Brother To Brother

Are You With Me Baby is just awesome throughout.

Gimme You was also a great album...the first of three versions of "The Bigger The Love".

Not at all...actually just saw that...was just looking at your site - had seen it before, good reference for all things Billy. Glad there are some of us out there who love him.

Pity that these old albums are so hard to find on CD. I've been searching for them for years and only got my hands on them in the past few weeks. Now all I need is Memphis in Manhattan and I'll have all the Billy albums.

Amazingly enough though you can give people links to albums like these old Billy ones, which I think are great and nobody seems to want them. Everybody seems to want John Stewart's Bomb's Away Dream Babies instead!!! Oh well...

Yeah, I kept hoping that they'd see official cd release, but eventually had to give in and buy the cds you got as well. The guy that put them together recorded them from previously unplayed vinyl, added the bonus tracks, and cleaned up the sound a bit, but it's still not the same as a true remaster. Plus poor Billy doesn't get paid for them.

Oh, and you simply must get Memphis in Manhattan. "My Love Will Not Change" is absolutely one of my favorite Burnette songs ever!


That doesn't surprise me one bit. I mean, Bombs Away Dream Babies is a fantastic album and I love John Stewart (R.I.P.), but I think too many Mac fans have blinders on when it comes to the members of the band. If it's not Nicks, Buckingham, McVie or Green, it may as well just not exist.

Yes I fully agree. I've said this elsewhere but I love Billy, Rick and Dave Walker just to name a few. So much talent in the Mac, such a pity that most people don't get past Stevie & Lindsey. I must admit I started there too, but I quickly started to listen to the non Rumours period, and went from there. The Stevie/Lindsey fans don't know what they are missing.

I haven't been able to find anything concrete about the release date of the Frog Prince single, I've still never seen a stock copy of it, just promos. So it may never have even been "released' as such but if we could at least figure out the release year for sure it'd be great). My guess is '69 but it could've been as early as '67 (since that's when the Warners-Seven Arts merger was and that's how the single was labeled but unfortunately there's no year listed on the label. Please do post anything further about this if you come across it though (I think I just put '69 in the discog just to get soemthing in there for now since I'm still trying to plug up as many holes on the exitsing items as I can for now so we can see what we have from there & it's a database which is easier to delete from than add to). :)

John

Thanks John.

I didn't know that. I guess you learn something new every day.

So he could've been as young as 14 then. "Frog Prince" may not be earth-shattering, but for having been made by a teenager I'd say it's pretty damn good.

Billy's 1972, 1979, 1980 albums along with Between Friends and Gimme You have definitely not been released on CD format. I know that Soldier Of Love and Brother To Brother were released on CD in Japan (but not America?) I am under the assumption that Try Me may have been released on CD in Japan too given the other two Curb releases were released on CD, but I've never seen an actual copy anywhere.

Given the amount of substandard music that's released, you would think somewhere along the line that someone would rerelease these albums. Obviously there's a fanbase for Billy, otherwise how would he be able to keep releasing albums all these years?

Matt

Yes you'd assume that there are more people who like him than the six or so people who have contributed to this thread?

I've seen from the Penguin discographies that some of his singles have charted in the country charts over the years, but does anyone know actually how commercially successful Billy's solo stuff has been?

It's Billy's song "All I Can Do Is Dream You" that was sung by Roy Orbison, which got me to check out Billy's other work in the 1st place, including Fleetwood Mac. But there was no internet back then, and in those European woods where I grew up at the time, information on back catalogues of rock musicians was hard to get for a kid. So I was happy to find "Coming Home" in a mailorder catalogue when it came out. What a great album that is. It was my first contact with country music, and I'd recommend it to anyone as an introduction to country, because there is enough rock and pop in there to not put people off that have prejudices against country, of which there are sadly many amongst my generation. People my age seem to love techno, grunge, alternative rock, metal and boy/girl groups and the occasional superstar like one Robbie Williams over here.
I think the wait between "Are You With Me Baby" and "Memphis in Manhattan" was too long, especially regarding how many songs are on the latter, that Billy had already recorded previously.
I was lucky enough to buy the fabulous "All Night Long" album from the Penguin online store, before that one disappeared, but I must say that I prefer the version of "Memphis Blues" that he plays on Paul Burlison's "Train Kept A-Rollin'" album.
I enjoyed it a lot when I saw Billy play live with John Fogerty in Cologne, Germany, where he got to play the solo in "I Heard it Through the Grapevine".
"Do You Know" is a song that I fell deeply in love to, and even though that didn't work out, it's still one of my favourites.
I'm all for a new Billy Burnette solo album, hoping the Fleetwood Mac-style pop influence will be in the mix, too, just like the rockabilly and the country.
I feel the "BTM band" could have recorded a really great album at the time of the "Chain" boxed set, based on the strength of songs like "Love Shines", "Paper Doll" and some of the tracks that I heard on this board, like "Victim Of Love", the latter still not being on a Billy album to this day, or is it?
But still, I understand that the "BTM band" dissolved, because it's just too much for any musician to tour behind 4 albums out of which only 1 is your own.

I'd say there's no real excuse for It Ain't Over not being on the 1987 tour. Christine sang and played on it, Mick played on it, and it would have been the perfect sentiment for that tour.