the traveling wilburys started in 1988. the international department at warner brothers records asked george harrison to write a b-side song for his single, "this is love". in vinyl records, there is one song (or group of songs) on the top of the disc, and then the user can pick the disc up, turn it over, and have the record player play music on the bottom of the disc. the top is called the a side and the bottom is called the b side. in the late 1980s, most record companies sold single records with a famous song on the a side and a new song on the b side. harrison wrote "handle with care" to be the b-side for "this is love". because some of harrison's friends were there keeping him company, they decided to sing "handle with care" together. the record company decided "handle with care" was too good a song to be a b-side, so they asked the men if they would make a whole album.