ROOTS of Country Music

The Professional Work of Red Simpson

A regular on the Bakersfield club scene during the 1960s and a prolific songwriter, Red Simpson made his mark with wave with big rig songs. Red Simpson was born on March 6, 1934 in Higley, Arizona, into a musical family that later relocated to Bakersfield, California. He played in a country band while service in Korea aboard the naval hospital ship, the Repose, then played the clubs around Bakersfield, California, where he became a professional musician.

Simpson was working at the Wagon Wheel in Lamont, California when Fuzzy Owens (Haggard’s future manager) saw him and arranged for Simpson to work at his Clover Club as a piano player. Red then got a job replacing rising star Buck Owens at the Blackboard Club on weekends.

After several years as an excellent song writer and respectable country music performer, Simpson finally came into his own by pretending to be something he wasn't: A truck driver. For years prior to the trucker music craze, Simpson was one of the most prolific and admired of all country music song smiths. Merle Haggard and Buck Owens were Simpson's two biggest clients. Simpson began writing songs with Buck in 1962. As a songwriter, Red scored his first number one hit with Sam's Place, recorded by Buck. After that, Simpson decided to become a full-time writer. Buck alone recorded thirty-five tunes written by Red.

Red began recording for Capitol Records in 1966 and charted the top-40 singles, Roll Truck Roll (1966), The Highway patrol (1966), Diesel Smoke (1966) and his only top-ten, I’m a Truck (No. 4, 1971). Throughout the album, Roll Truck Roll, the loneliness, transience and kinetic energy of truck driving are married with great effect to the emotional ups and downs of country singing and Red Simpson proves himself an able interpreter of his own top-shelf songs. In 1972, he debuted on the Grand Ole Opry.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Researched and written by Richard Bell, Roots of Country Music, Nov. 10, 2009.