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C.W. McCall - Convoy

C.W. McCall - Convoy Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Black Bear Road
Released: 1975

Convoy Lyrics

Was the dark of the moon on the sixth of June
In a Kenworth pullin' logs
Cab-over Pete with a reefer on
And a Jimmy haulin' hogs
We is headin' for bear on I-one-oh
'Bout a mile outta Shaky Town
I says, "Pig Pen, this here's the Rubber Duck.
"And I'm about to put the hammer down."

'Cause we got a little ol' Convoy
Rockin' through the night.
Yeah, we got a little ol' convoy,
Ain't she a beautiful sight?
Come on and join our convoy
Ain't nothin' gonna get in our way.
We gonna roll this truckin' convoy
'Cross the U-S-A.
Convoy!

By the time we got into Tulsa Town,
We had eighty-five trucks in all.
But they's a roadblock up on the cloverleaf,
And them bears was wall-to-wall.
Yeah, them smokies is thick as bugs on a bumper;
They even had a bear in the air!
I says, "Callin' all trucks, this here's the Duck.
"We about to go a-huntin' bear."

'Cause we got a great big convoy
Rockin' through the night.
Yeah, we got a great big convoy,
Ain't she a beautiful sight?
Come on and join our convoy
Ain't nothin' gonna get in our way.
We gonna roll this truckin' convoy
'Cross the U-S-A.
Convoy!

Well, we rolled up Interstate 44
Like a rocket sled on rails.
We tore up all of our swindle sheets,
And left 'em settin' on the scales.
By the time we hit that Chi-town,
Them bears was a-gettin' smart:
They'd brought up some reinforcements
From the Illinois National Guard.
There's armored cars, and tanks, and jeeps,
And rigs of ev'ry size.
Yeah, them chicken coops was full'a bears
And choppers filled the skies.
Well, we shot the line and we went for broke
With a thousand screamin' trucks
An' eleven long-haired Friends a' Jesus
In a chartreuse micra-bus.

Well, we laid a strip for the Jersey shore
Prepared to cross the line
I could see the bridge was lined with bears
But I didn't have a dog-goned dime.
I says, "Pig Pen, this here's the Rubber Duck.
"We just ain't a-gonna pay no toll."
So we crashed the gate doing ninety-eight
I says "Let them truckers roll, 10-4."

'Cause we got a mighty convoy
Rockin' through the night.
Yeah, we got a mighty convoy,
Ain't she a beautiful sight?
Come on and join our convoy
Ain't nothin' gonna get in our way.
We gonna roll this truckin' convoy
'Cross the U-S-A.
Convoy! Convoy! Convoy! Convoy!

Writer/s: BOXCAR WILLIE
Publisher: MIZ BOX MUSIC
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

Convoy

This is a novelty song inspired by the CB radio craze of the mid-'70s. The story of "Convoy" was told in CB jargon and with a Country and Western (the "C.W.") twang. (thanks, Edward Pearce - Ashford, Kent, England)

C.W. McCall is a character created by songwriter Bill Fries. While he displayed musical promise as a child, he was more interested in graphic design. While attending the University of Iowa, Fries studied music and played in the school's concert band, but his major was in fine arts, and after graduation he began handling the art chores at an Omaha, Nebraska television station. After 5 years there, he was hosting his own program, where he drew caricatures of celebrities. Fries signed on as the art director for an Omaha advertising agency in the early '60s, and it was there that he created the character C.W. McCall as a selling tool for an area bakery. A trucker for the fictional Old Home Bread company who spent much of his time in a diner called The Old Home Filler-Up-an'-Keep-On-a-Truckin' Cafe, the McCall character was a huge hit with viewers, and the radio campaign won Fries the advertising industry's prestigious Clio Award. In 1974, Fries decided to cut a record under the McCall moniker, and the single, a monologue with country backing titled after the aforementioned cafe, became a hit. A follow-up single, "Wolf Creek Pass," was even more successful.

This hit #1 on both the Pop and Country charts, and a national craze was born.

Sam Peckinpah made a 1978 movie based on the song starring Kris Kristofferson and Ally McGraw. By the time the movie was released, however, McCall's music career was largely over. He released two more albums, but in 1977, McCall turned his back on the music industry to focus on the burgeoning environmental movement and moved to the small town of Ouray, CO. He was elected mayor of the town in 1982. An attempt at a comeback in 1990 proved unsuccessful. (thanks, Bob - Knoxville, TN, for above 3)

There was a serious side to this song. It dealt with the struggles truckers were facing with restrictive speed limits, tolls, bureaucracy and fuel costs.

"Old Home Bread" was a real bread company in Iowa, where the ads were broadcast. They were filmed in Pisgah, a small town in the Western part of the state. (thanks, Scott - Eugene, OR)

Some of the CB terms used and their meanings:

Got a Copy - do you hear me?

Jimmy - a GMC truck. GMC no longer builds class 8 trucks.

Headin' for bear - coming up on a police blockade. "Bear" is the CB slang term for "police."

Shakeytown - Los Angeles, California

Put the hammer down - speed up

Tulsa-town - Tulsa, Oklahoma

Smokies - highway state patrol officers

Bear in the air - police helicopter

Ten-nine (10-9) - repeat message

Swindle Sheets - truckers' logs. Truckers have to keep logs of what they were hauling. These "swindle sheets" must be presented to Department Of Transportation officers on request.

Chi-town - Chicago, Illinois

Chicken Coop - weigh station

Longhaired friends of Jesus - hippies

Microbus - Volkswagen Microbus. Very popular vehicle among the hippies during the 1960s and 1970s. Another popular song that mentions the Volkswagen Microbus is "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" by Arlo Guthrie.

"Keep the bugs off your glass and the bears off your... tail" - The real phrase is "keep the bugs off your glass and the bears off your a**". A typical CB sign-off that means to drive carefully and watch out for speedtraps.

"What's your twenty?" - "Where are you?"

"Catch you on the flip-flop" - "I'll talk to you on my return trip (on the way back home)." (thanks, Patrick - Tallapoosa, GA)

This song is referenced in chapter 5 of the textbook Infrared Detectors and Systems by Dereniak and Boreman. In the same way a journal article or textbook is referenced, the authors point to the song as proof that semitrailer trucks travel in convoys to draw an analogy to how photons, or light quanta, tend to bunch up as they are emitted. (thanks, Alejandro - Albuquerque, NM)