Sidebar: From Old Home Bread To ‘Convoy’ To ‘Grand Theft Auto’ C.W. McCall’s Enduring Legacy

The fictional trucker/singer C.W. McCall wasn’t part of Mannheim Steamroller, but he did become a cultural phenomenon that led to Chip Davis earning the award of SESAC County Music Writer of the Year and, eventually, a full-length film starring Kris Kristofferson. 

Featuring the voice of advertising executive William Fries, C.W. McCall started as an advertisement for Old Home Bread. The character, a handsome trucker well-versed in CB lingo, would frequently stop at diners, flirt with waitresses and endorse his favorite bread. Those ads became a national phenomenon.

C.W. McCall signed to MGM Records and released the smash hit single “Convoy” in 1975, which would be certified Gold by the RIAA and Davis was named SESAC Country Music Writer of the Year in 1976. C.W. McCall released several more albums through the years and singles that addressed the Iran Hostage Crisis and a dispute over pine-tar in a Yankees-Royals baseball game. 

Bill Fries went on to be elected mayor of Ouray, Colo., in 1986. More recently, the “Convoy” was named to Rolling Stone’s “100 Greatest Country Songs of All-Time” list in 2014 and was used in the video game “Grand Theft Auto V.”