Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis – “Motor City Man”
“Motor City Man” was written by the late Walter Hyatt.
Bruce Robison writes:
I am not crazy about the term “cover.” Not sure what that means. I guess I figure you sing or record a song because you can bring something new to it or make people dance or drink or have a good time and forget troubles for a minute. Songs are magic. Songs can change so much in a different voice or gender or generation.
From the first moment I started calling myself a songwriter, I felt steeped in the tradition of the Tin Pan Alley guys or Brill Building or Nashville country guys. You need a song? I got one, goes a little like this….and it’s an incredibly wonderful feeling to get anyone to sing or record a song you wrote.
The Nashville I knew was all about songs. People would really listen and everybody seemed to know that anybody could have one great song. Pair that with the right singer at the right time and it’s magic.
The Austin I knew was all about scenes. They come and go. I never really had one, but I sure had friends who did. Three elements: band, night of the week, and club. Then it’s the place to be, and you get to tell that boring story, “I used to see them when there was nobody.” I could name you lots of these scenes since I have been in Austin. I bet there is a couple I don’t know about happening tonight.
One that I heard about a lot, but was before my time, was Uncle Walt’s Band at the Waterloo Ice house (long gone) on Congress in the late 70s and early 80s. Robert Keen told me the guys in the band were like good-looking hippy gods. Three guys who had moved together from Spartanburg, South Carolina. To hear the band now, I would think Austin was probably the obvious choice.
Champ Hood I knew the best. He played in Kelly’s band for years, truly beloved in Austin as the player’s player, sweetheart of a guy, always in loafers and never played it the same way twice. With his groovy fiddle and blue Collings guitar, he was one of the guys who made Austin Austin. Our little part of town was heartbroken when Champ died of cancer in 2001.
David Ball played the bass, great singer, maybe with the heaviest South Carolina drawl of all of them. You can sure hear it on his country radio hits, “Thinkin’ Problem” and “Riding with Private Malone.”
Walter Hyatt made a record called “King Tears” that Kelly listened to a hundred times the year we first started going out. The three of them together? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard, “you shoulda seen them back when.”
I’m not sure I ever met Walter Hyatt. I didn’t know his song “Motor City Man” from back in the day or from Champ’s son Warren Hood who played it in his band. Kelly found it when we were looking for songs, the chord changes are really creative, really great melody, and, eureka!, a story that is not a love song. I loved hearing Kelly sing it, really thought we should try to record it after the harmonies worked. And my crappy cross harp part sounded really cool.
I believe Walter was coming home from a gig when his plane went down in the Florida Everglades in 1996. I don’t know if Walter had a motor city man in his life, or just was able to write an amazing song that makes you wonder how a boy from South Carolina did that. It is the song that people quote back to us, the lyric I get suck on is:
I could only understand that my dad’s a good man
And he’s glad payday.
It’s different, partly, because it’s from the kid’s point of view.
It’s great singing Walters song. And when we do, I can picture all three of ’em, young hippy gods, singin’ to a packed house.
During recording, we had the idea to find some old footage of classic cars rolling off the assembly line to accompany the song. My old buddy Glenn, our video editor, dug up vintage footage from Detroit that focused on people. The Motor City men, women, and children smiling back from the past, just like Walter’s song, full of good old American hopes and dreams.
– Bruce Robison, June 24, 2014