Comin' Right at Ya: How a Jewish Yankee Hippie Went Country, or, the Often Outrageous History of Asleep at the Wheel (Brad and Michele Moore Roots Music Series)

by Ray Benson, David Menconi

Overview

“Full of humor and humility . . . Since Benson started Asleep at the Wheel as a working-class country band, it’s one helluva ride worth telling.” —The Austin Chronicle
 
A six-foot-seven-inch Jewish hippie from Philadelphia starts a Western swing band in 1970. It sounds like a joke but—more than forty years, twenty-five albums, and nine Grammy Awards later—Asleep at the Wheel is still drawing crowds around the world. The roster of musicians who’ve shared a stage with the Wheel is a who’s who of American popular music—Van Morrison, Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, George Strait, Vince Gill, Lyle Lovett, and so many more. And the bandleader who’s brought them all together is the hippie that claimed Bob Wills’s boots: Ray Benson.
 
In this hugely entertaining memoir, Benson looks back over his life and wild ride with Asleep at the Wheel from the band’s beginning in Paw Paw, West Virginia, through its many years as a Texas institution. He vividly recalls all the inevitable ups and downs and changes in personnel and describes the making of classic albums such as Willie and the Wheel and Tribute to the Music of Bob Willsand the Texas Playboys. The ultimate music industry insider, Benson explains better than anyone else how the Wheel got rock hipsters and die-hard country fans to love groovy new-old Western swing. Decades later, they still do.
 
“Ray Benson is something—creative, fun, entertaining—you’ll love this book!” —Dolly Parton
 
“I’ve known Ray Benson for over forty years and never could figure out how he does all he does while asleep at the wheel! This book, however, tells how it all went down!” —Willie Nelson

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781477307748
Publisher:	University of Texas Press
Publication date:	02/24/2022
Series:	Brad and Michele Moore Roots Music Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	201
File size:	17 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Ray Benson cofounded Asleep at the Wheel in 1970 and is the only remaining original band member. When he isn’t playing with the Wheel, he’s producing records, TV shows, and commercials; acting in movies; doing voice-over work; running a studio; and raising funds for numerous charities. He was named “Official Texas State Musician” in 2004 and “Texan of the Year” in 2011.A former contributing editor for No Depression magazine, David Menconi has been the music critic at the Raleigh News & Observer since 1991. He is the author of Ryan Adams: Losering, a Story of Whiskeytown and coeditor of the American Music Series for the University of Texas Press.

Table of Contents

Prologue: February 15, 1979Friday's ChildYou Get a Smile Every Time with the Heads-up Taste of a BallantineBright Lights, Big CitiesAlmost Heaven, West VirginiaA Name of Our OwnAsleep at the Wheel Goes to WashingtonGo West, Young Man (and Woman) On the Road AgainInto the Mystic with "The Beatles of Western Swing"Austin CallingOn the BusSpinning Texas Gold"Framed" Deadly SinsWrite Your Own SongThe Zen of WillieThe Film Industry Is a Series of Peaks and Valleys615 BluesRide with BobRide with JobInto the BlackEpilogue: Bringing It All Back HomeAcknowledgmentsIndex

What People are Saying About This

Dolly Parton

Ray Benson is something—creative, fun, entertaining—you’ll love this book!

Richard Linklater

It's hard to miss big Ray Benson in Austin, Texas. And there is no missing his love for the music of his adopted state of Texas. Enjoy his improbable story.

Willie Nelson

I’ve known Ray Benson for over forty years and never could figure out how he does all he does while asleep at the wheel! This book, however, tells how it all went down!

Editorial Reviews

Highly recommended.

Ink29

"Benson has a treasure trove of outlandish anecdotes, assorted nuggets of wisdom, and a deep and vast wealth of musical knowledge to share."

PopMatters - Jeff Strowe

Benson has a treasure trove of outlandish anecdotes, assorted nuggets of wisdom, and a deep and vast wealth of musical knowledge to share.

PopMatters

Asleep at the Wheel and country music fans will have trouble putting down this book, which barrels forward with all the energy of a Saturday night show at a dance hall in Austin. . . . Benson is the wily old veteran, spinning yarns and imparting wisdom learned from years on the road. We’d all be wise to listen.

Jewish Book Council

Full of humor and humility and a truly iconoclast outlook on life . . .  since Benson started Asleep at the Wheel as a working-class country band, it's one helluva ride worth telling.

Austin Chronicle

A let-it-all-hangout memoir.

Texas Monthly

2015-07-27
Affable, easygoing, sometimes almost-too-mellow memoir by the noted evangelist of Western swing music and driver of Asleep at the Wheel. "I guess it was inevitable that I'd wind up a slow-moving hippie," writes Benson—and not just because he was born on a Friday, and Friday's child, in the old nursery rhyme, is "loving and giving." Usually, but not always: "Yes, I was an asshole a lot of the time, and I regret a lot of the toes I stepped on, but there were some things I had to do to make it work," he writes. The "it" was converting a bunch of dope-smoking college buddies from local heroes in Paw Paw, West Virginia, into world-class champions of country music in the Bob Wills tradition—an unlikely transformation for a nice Jewish boy brought up on the British Invasion. Still, Benson recalls, it wasn't such an unusual choice after all: he loved country music, and among his jazz-loving, radical, longhair pals, there was plenty of appreciation for the thought of country as the music of the people. Fast-forward out of the West Virginia—and, occasionally, Washington, D.C.—music scene, and Benson has transported his merry band to Texas, where the Wills sound began, and into a (mostly) benevolent dictatorship to get the sound he wants. The usual suspects are there, of course: Willie with his doober, Johnny Paycheck with his growl, Bill Clinton with his—well, his chicken plucking. And the usual tropes are there, for though it ain't rock 'n' roll, there was plenty of sex and drugs in Benson's corner of the country. "I'm not sure anybody is ever in control of their cocaine habit," he writes with a certain quiet pride, "but I was probably as close as you can get." Spinning through jazz, blues, country, and rock, giving boosts to the likes of George Strait and Lyle Lovett, the author genially recounts a merry and generally mayhem-free life in music. A pleasure for fans of Benson and the band.

Kirkus Reviews