Chill Wills, Willie Nelson, Crash Stewart and Gino McCoslin
Before Willie and Shirley divorced, Ray Price and I were planning a Texas tour, and I was in Nashville discussing the details of the tour when Price got a fantastic offer to tour up north for a promoter named Abe Hamza.
Price reluctantly told me for financial reasons he must take the Hamza tour. Willie jumped up and said to me, “I will take Price’s place.”
I said okay, but told WIllie he was not equal to Price at this stage of his career. Willie said “I know that, but we will hire another big star to replace Price and call it the WIllie Nelson show starring the other names who are actually better known than I am.”
The artist we chose to replace Price was Marty Robbins. And on the same tour we hired Charlie Pride and gave him his first touring job. Willie heard Charlie sing and he agreed that I was right. Stonewall Jackson, Jeannie Sealy, Hank Cochran and Johnny Bush were the other artists on the tour.
After the Texas tour it was WIllie’s idea that I start booking from my finance company office in San Antonio. We formed a partnerhsip, which lasted for five years and I can honestly sat that Wilile and I never had a cross world.
My first agreement with Willie was that I had to get $400 a night for WIllie and the band on a week night, $500 on a Friday or Sunday and $600 on a Saturday night.
Our first engagement was at the WFW Hall in Alice, which we had to promote ourselves. We came out okay on the date and never looked back. One of our next dates was a dance at the Melody Ranch in San Antionio
The members of the band at this stage were Jimmy Day on steel guitar, Wade Ray on fiddle and Johnny Bush on base and drums. The other drummer’s name escapes me.
The WIllie Nelson and Johnny Bush era was hilarious. They would be in San Antonio and get a job in Houston, for instance, and not have the money to get there, so they would hock their guitars to have gas money and when they got there they would have to borrow a guitar.
About that time, Willie worked as a door-to-door salesman selling encyclopedias, which Willie told me he enjoyed very much.
Willie also worked as a disc jockey and salesman for KiKK in Houston, and Willie will openly tell you that he was fired because he could not pick and sing at night and get up in time to do his morning radio spot.
Leroy Gloger, who at that time was the owner of KIKK, has had many a laugh with Willie over his firing.
One thing about Willie is that if you were right and you had to make a decision that went against Wilile, then he would understand. However, you better be right.
When WIllie and Bush were both wroking at KBOP in Pleasanton as disc jockies, they were picking and singing around San ANtonio and one morning Bush ran out of gas on the way to work. He had to hitchhike to Pleasanton.
About 3 hours later, Willie was on his way to relieve Bush when he passed Bush’s car on the side of the road.
About a mile further down the road, Willie ran out of gas.
It is funny in this day and time to look back and realize how two superstars of today did not have the money to buy enough gas to get to their daytime jobs. Dee Parker was the owner of KBOP at the time.
Another funny story that WIllie told me was when he and Bush were hitchiking to West Texas to play a job and they were not having any luck in catching a ride. About a block away a freight train stopped which was going in their direction.
Willie got the wild idea for him and Bush to hop the freight. As they approached the train, it started moving very slowly. Willie and Bush tossed thier luggage on the flat car, then their guitars.
By this time the train was going so fast they could not get aboard and they lost their luggage and their guitars.
On the way back from the same West Texas trip, Willie said the warmest place he found to sleep was a culvert.
Willie and Bush moved all around Texas, mainly between Ft. Worth, Houston, and San Antonio and about this time they were staying in Houston a little bit more because Bush had relatives there and they would always find a hot meal and a warm bed.
Willie’s songwriter ability must have rubbed off on Bush as he penned the great song “Whiskey River,” which WIllie opens his shows with. I feel Willie opens with it as a secret tribute to his friend Bush.
Willie was recording for RCA records at this ime and Chet Atkins, the famous guitar player, was Willie’s producer and one of the funniest things I ever heard Chet way was, “If Willie Nelson don’t make it, there ain’t going to be no happening.”
Anyway, I was in the studio every time Willie was to make a recording. Although Willie never says much, I could tell he was not happy with the way Chet was recording him.
Most pickers think Willie breaks meter and they will try to hesitate and rush to keep up with his phrasing. They are wrong.
Willie has never broken meter in his life and the pickers would just pick the song as it is supposed to be Willie will be there at the proper time regardless of his phrasing.
One time I told Willie I was afraid he was too far ahead of his time with his lyrics, and WIllie told me he wished the world would hurry up and catch up with him as he needed the money.
Willie is the type of person that all he needs to write a song is one simple thought.
Willie wrote a couple of songs that I had given him the idea by just making a statement. For instance, Willie had asked me to teach him to rope calves, and the first itme he made a sucessful catch I hollored at Willie that it was one in a row.
So he immediately sat down and wrote “That Makes One in a Row.”
After Willie had stayed in Nashville for about two years, my pohone at home rang one night and it was Willie.
He told me his house had burned down in Nashsville and he wanted to come back to Texas and he wanted me to find him a house close to a golf course.
I found him a house on the golf course at Lost Valley Ranch in Bandera.
Willie was heartbroken about losing his home, his belongings and about 500 songs he had written that were not yet published.
Willie wasn’t in a mood to work much and he asked me to book a few dates for him at John T. Floors Country Store in Helotes. All Willie wanted to do was make some money to live on and pay the band.
Willie and I decided we wanted to promote some more shows and we got John T. Floore to back us financially. John T. and Willie remaind friends until John T’s death several years later. I guess if an entertainer ever had a night club he could call home, Willie would call Floore’s Country Store his home.
From Willie Nelson Family Album
by Lana Nelson
1980