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C.W. McCall is the pseudonym of William Dale Fries, Jr. (born November 15, 1928, Audubon, Iowa, United States).

Biography

In 1973, while working as a creative director for Bozell & Jacobs, an Omaha, Nebraska advertising agency, Fries created a Clio Award-winning [1974] television advertising campaign for the Metz Baking Company. The ads featured a truck driver named C.W. McCall, who was played by Dallas, Texas actor Jim Finlayson. The waitress named Mavis Davis was played by Dallas, Texas actress Jean McBride Capps. The commercial's success led to songs such as "Old Home Filler-Up an' Keep on a-Truckin' Café," "Wolf Creek Pass," and "Black Bear Road." Fries sang and wrote the lyrics, and Chip Davis, later of Mannheim Steamroller, wrote the music.

McCall is best known for the 1976 #1 hit song "Convoy," which came at the peak of the CB fad in the United States. Far from a one-hit wonder, McCall first charted the song "Wolf Creek Pass," which hit #40 on the U.S. pop top 40 in 1975. At least three other songs hit Billboard's pop Hot 100, including "Old Home Filler-Up an' Keep on a-Truckin' Cafe," "'Round the World with the Rubber Duck" (a pirate-flavored sequel to "Convoy"), as well as the environmentally-oriented "There Won't Be No Country Music (There Won't Be No Rock 'n' Roll)." A dozen McCall songs hit Billboard's country singles chart, including the sentimental "Roses For Mama" (1977).

In 1978, the movie Convoy was released, based on the C.W. McCall song. The film starred Kris Kristofferson, Ali MacGraw, Burt Young and Ernest Borgnine and was directed by Sam Peckinpah. It featured a new version of the song, written specifically for the film.

In addition to the "original six" McCall albums released between 1975 and 1979, two rare singles exist. "Kidnap America" was a politically/socially-conscious track released in 1980 during the Iran hostage crisis, while "Pine Tar Wars" referred to an event that actually happened in a New York Yankees-Kansas City Royals baseball game in 1983.

In 1986, McCall (William Fries) was elected mayor of the town of Ouray, Colorado, ultimately serving for six years.¹

In 1990, American Gramaphone Records issued a CD containing a number of old McCall tracks re-recorded for the digital CD age, plus a new song, "Comin' Back For More," which was inspired by Alferd Packer, an alleged cannibal from the 19th century.

Discography

Original studio albums

• Wolf Creek Pass (1974)
• Black Bear Road (1975)
• Wilderness (1976)
• Rubber Duck (1976)
• Roses for Mama (1977)
• C.W. McCall and Co. (1979)
• The Real McCall: An American Storyteller (1990)
• American Spirit (with Mannheim Steamroller) (2003)

Greatest hits compilations

• C.W. McCall's Greatest Hits (1983, rereleased 1993)
• Four Wheel Cowboy (1989)
• The Legendary C.W. McCall (1991)
• The Best of C.W. McCall (1997)

External links

• C.W. McCall: An American Legend
• Bozell Jacobs
• Convoy The Movie

Notes

References

• Bernhardt, Jack. (1998). "C.W. McCall". In The Encyclopedia of Country Music. Paul Kingsbury, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 333.

Wikipedia content modification information:

• This page was last modified on 28 December 2008, at 02:04.

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