Western swing legend drives Asleep at the Wheel's dedication to 'forgotten' music

06/03/2001

By MARIO TARRADELL / The Dallas Morning News

AUSTIN – To the casual observer, Ray Benson's Bismeaux Productions looks like a nondescript pair of blue houses on a quiet street in a south side neighborhood.

But inside, the daily endeavors are much more noteworthy: the business and recordings of venerable Western swing band Asleep at the Wheel.

Erich Schlegel / DMN Ray Benson works the mixing boards in Asleep at the Wheel's studio in Austin.

Bismeaux Studios, where Wheel albums have been created since 1990, are in the rear. A few trees, cement and a short walk separate the recording facilities from the offices.

Mr. Benson's office overlooks the studio. But you'd be hard-pressed to notice anything outside these four walls. That's because there's so much in here to focus on – stacks of magazines, shelves of vinyl record albums, rows of CDs, a stereo system, an old phonograph, photographs, books, knickknacks.

There's even a curious, eye-catching collection of Route 66 memorabilia. If it sports the famous Route 66 logo, Mr. Benson has it on display. There's a Route 66 cigarette lighter, a jar of salsa, salt and pepper shakers, coffee mugs, a bottle of water, a can of beer, a jug of wine and a Route 66 brick.

So much sensory overload suits 50-year-old Mr. Benson just fine. In fact, he thrives on it.

A driving dedication: Ray Benson • Asleep at the Wheel • Extra content index

"It's that curiosity about everything that drives me," he says in his trademark booming voice. "I've been very lucky to be able to incorporate that in what I do. Curiosity didn't kill the cat – it just made him smarter."

'Forgotten music'

Especially since the Wheel set out to honor much more than just Bob Wills' Western swing legacy. Mr. Benson goes to great lengths to clarify that the impetus for starting the band was roots music and especially "forgotten music." We're talking Cajun, hillbilly, bluegrass, jump, swing, blues and, yes, Western swing.

The album is a collection of newly recorded Wheel staples, not the usual compilation of old material, that includes "The Letter That Johnny Walker Read," "Take Me Back to Tulsa," "House of Blue Lights" and "Miles and Miles of Texas." Guest stars on the disc range from vocalist Mandy Barnett to singer and guitar picker Brad Paisley, steel guitarist Lloyd Maines and Huey Lewis on harmonica.

"I looked at our sales sheet on our albums and noticed that there were four or five 'best of' Asleep at the Wheel albums and none of them were 'the best of,'" Mr. Benson says.

"They basically were from different labels that all had catalog on us, and they put it together and called it 'the best of.' My definition of 'the best of' is what people want to hear every night, what they keep requesting."

These songs span more than 25 years, much of the band's recorded output. Mr. Benson was involved with every one of them – as a singer, an arranger, a musician, a songwriter, a producer or all of the above.

He has basked in the accolades that eight Grammy awards afford. He's been at the helm for more than 20 studio albums, a baker's dozen record labels and a whopping 80 personnel changes.

"A lot of credit goes to him for being able to keep the band together when most bands would have folded," says Dallas-based Tim Alexander, who was the Wheel's keyboardist and accordionist from 1984 through 1996.

"He put a second mortgage on his house. Every time they went on the road, they lost money. But he kept it going," Mr. Alexander says. "He has been the manager, dealing with the record companies, and then he puts on his musical hat. All of that has kept him alive long enough to make his way through his musical mission."

The beginnings

He had a voracious appetite, an unquenchable curiosity about different genres of music. And through his transistor radio, he listened to stations from Mexico, New York, Canada. He heard country, blues, swing, folk, rock 'n' roll, Cajun and even some Latin music.

His father, mechanical engineer Maurey Seifert, had a subscription to Cashbox magazine, which was then considered a recording-industry bible the way Billboard is today. Little Ray studied it, learning about charts, record labels, songwriters, producers and a variety of musical genres.

Before long, he was in a local folk group, the Four Gs, which also included his sister and two neighborhood boys. They played the PTA circuit, eventually graduating to hootenannies.

They even got offered a recording contract. His parents turned it down.

"Oh, yeah, I was a professional when I was 11," he says with a smile, then points to a black and white photograph hanging on the wall. "See that picture over there, those kids? That's me at the top, age 11, my sister and our two neighbors. It was the folk revolution of the 1960s."

And it changed his life.

Sure, Mr. Benson went to Antioch College in Yellow Spring, Ohio, to be a filmmaker. He even landed a plum New York job as an apprentice film editor. But it wasn't long before his curiosity about country – and other styles of music – got the best of him.

"I was there for three months," he remembers. "After the third month, I said, 'I don't ever want to do this again. I don't want to see a dark room in New York or L.A. I want to play country music.'"

He ended up on a farm in Paw Paw, W.Va., in 1970, teamed up with buddies Leroy Preston and Lucky Oceans, and they formed Asleep at the Wheel. They played country, back when it was called country-Western, and a slew of American roots music, including Western swing.

At first it was just the three of them commanding an assortment of instruments. They ventured onto the local concert circuit with plenty of youthful abandon and a burning desire to play.

The Wheel rolled from Paw Paw to San Francisco before Mr. Benson and his cohorts took the advice of country legend Willie Nelson and permanently relocated to Austin in January 1974. Texas, he remembers, immediately felt like home.

"It was amazing," Mr. Benson says. "Willie was here, Jerry Jeff [Walker], Michael Murphey and a hundred bands nobody ever remembers anymore. We had Stevie Vaughan, Delbert McClinton, the Thunderbirds, Asleep at the Wheel, Lou Ann Barton, all those people. It was an incredible scene."

Passing the torch

He was at Sumet-Burnet studios in Dallas. Bob Wills, then in a wheelchair, was recording For the Last Time, his musical swan song. Mr. Benson's and Mr. Wills' paths intersected in a hallway. They were briefly introduced, then each went his separate way. Two years later, Mr. Wills was dead.

Call it the passing of the torch.

Today, Mr. Benson is the heir apparent to Mr. Wills' legacy. While other artists, from Mr. Haggard to George Strait, have occasionally incorporated Western swing into their repertoire, only Mr. Benson and his bandmates do it regularly.

"He's been exposing this music to a new generation," says Dixie Chick Emily Robison, who performed "Roly Poly" with Asleep at the Wheel on 1999's Grammy-winning Ride With Bob tribute album.

"Otherwise, it might have been a lost art form. There isn't anybody else doing it with as much expertise," Ms. Robison says. "And he's not cashing in on something – it's in his blood, his bones. ... The arrangements, the thought they put into the instrumentation, the harmonies. There aren't that many people who do that these days."

Mr. Benson accepts the comparisons and compliments with humility and pride.

"Mostly I'm a bandleader and Bob Wills was a bandleader," he says.

"To be a bandleader is just a different thing, and I don't have a list of criteria, but I know that's what I do. My job is to get the best out of the group of people that make this organization, and that's what Bob Wills did."

His loyalty spills into his private life, as well. Mr. Benson has been married to Diane Carr for 19 years. They have two sons, Sam, 17, and Aaron, 14. For such a curious soul, one who soaked up genre after genre with zeal, he has managed to remain focused creatively and personally.

"It would seem that I would go from project to project. On the other hand ... I'm very loyal and very committed. When I'm committed, that's it. You won't budge me. I feel very fortunate to be that way. That's why I wrote that song 'You Gotta Dance With Who Brung You.' That's what it's all about."