Bill Wilson arrives in Austin, Texas

Born in Lebanon, Indiana, and reared in nearby Brownsburg, Indiana, 19-year-old Bill Wilson joined the Air Force in 1966, taking a tour of duty in Vietnam. His final years of service, from 1968 to 1970, were served at Bergstrom Air Force BaseBergstrom Air Force Base was decommissioned by the U.S. government in 1993, the land sold to the City of Austin, and in 1997 reopened as Austin-Bergstrom International Airport., a Strategic Air Command facility, on the southern outskirts of Austin, Texas. Already an accomplished singer and songwriter, Bill used his off-duty evenings and weekends to perform at South Austin bars and nightclubs, gathering a solid following. He performed frequently alongside Cody Hubach, a popular folk singer who lived near Bergstrom, in tiny Manchaca. Sonobeat had begun recording sessions with Cody in May 1969, Cody and Bill bonded, and soon Cody introduced Bill to Sonobeat co-founders Bill Josey Sr. and Rim Kelley.

The Sonosong demo recordings

Bill’s first work with Sonobeat began in November 1969 with sessions that led to a non-commercial song demo album for Sonobeat’s publishing subsidiary, Sonosong. The album showcased eleven of Bill’s original compositions. Songs from the Catalog of Sonosong Music Company: Bill Wilson, Composer featured an eclectic mix of Bill’s blues, country, folk, and pop tunes. In August 2020, a copy of the demo – not more than 105 copies were manufactured – sold on eBay for $300, demonstrating that Bill’s music has remained in high demand over the decades as well as indicating how rare it is for copies to be in circulation (given that there appear to have been no other copies publicly available since 2020).

Because Bill performed his Sonosong demo album predominantly with guitar and harmonica accompaniment and, perhaps because the sole purpose of the album was to promote his songs and not Bill himself as a performer, Sonobeat’s archives contain only monaural mixes. Nonetheless, Bill’s vocal performances were solid and convincing and demonstrated his broad range of talents. Cindy Reynolds added vocal harmonies on The Merry-Go Man, a song about living an ignorant life that addresses the Vietnam war and that also likely was inspired by, but remained distinctly different from, The Beatles’ Nowhere Man. Several unissued recordings, including Big Train, a blues piece, were recorded in the sessions that produced Bill’s demo album and in sessions during the following months. These 55-year-old recordings remain fresh and relevant today, demonstrating the timelessness of Bill’s songs.

Sonobeat circulated Bill’s demo album to national record company A&RArtist & Repertoire (A&R) executives at record labels recruit and manage a roster of artists, connecting them to new songs and overseeing their recording and promotional activities. departments, hoping to solicit major artists to record some of the tunes. The Sonobeat archives don’t indicate how many copies were actually sent out to the national labels for review. The album was issued in mid-November ’69, even as Bill continued to cut addition original tracks for Sonobeat. Prolific Sonosong composer Herman Nelson was so impressed with Bill’s song demos that when Herman began work on Songs rom the Catalog of Sonosong Music Company: Herman Nelson, Composer, Volume 2, he asked Sonobeat to engage Bill to perform the 12 songs on the demo.

Bill returned to the Sonobeat in November ’69 for additional recording sessions that yielded The Man in Black, Wanna Go Back, Tastes of Summer, and The Old Man, but none of those recordings were released. Sonobeat superstar drummer Vince Mariani added cymbal flourishes to Tastes of Summer, and Sonobeat regular Mike Waugh provided bass on Tastes of Summer and The Old Man. Producer Bill Josey Sr. ordered a 33-1/3 RPM acetate reference transfer of The Old Man, which he sent to his friend Ron Bledsoe, an executive at Columbia Records in Nashville, hoping to either sell a single by Bill Wilson to Columbia or interest other Columbia artists in covering the song.

The demo album cover

Demo master tape side I front

Demo master tape side I back

Demo master tape side II front

Demo master tape side II back

Unissued recordings

Sonobeat considered commercially releasing Bill’s 100 Miles Out of Denver backed with When She Was Mine as a 45 RPM single but scrapped the idea for reasons not documented in the Sonobeat archives; however, had the single actually been released, the tracks almost certainly would have been re-recorded with additional instrumentation and would have been mixed in stereo, unlike the simple, mono demo versions.

The Mariani sessions

Wilson was as impressive a blues and rock singer as he was a composer, so he was tapped by the Joseys for Sonobeat’s legendary Mariani recording sessions in 1970. Bill contributed his strong and distinctive vocal talents to two songs on Mariani’s only album, Perpetuum Mobile, which Sonobeat issued only as a non-commercial “advance copy” pressing circulated to the major national record labels. Bill’s powerful performances on Mariani’s Last Milestone and I Can’t Hurt Myself are reminiscent of Blood, Sweat & Tears’ great vocalist David Clayton-Thomas.

Back to Indiana

After completing his tour of duty in the Air Force in 1970, Bill returned to native Indiana, settling in Bloomington, where in 1972 he joined The Pleasant Street Band. Later that year, he brought the band to Austin to record an album at Sonobeat. By 1972, Bill’s career was in full swing. On the combined strength of his Sonosong demo album (and perhaps the acetate of The Old Man Bill Josey had sent to Ron Bledsoe at Columbia) and Bill’s work with The Pleasant Street Band, Columbia Records commissioned Bill’s first solo album, Ever Changing Minstrel, recorded with members of Bob Dylan’s backing band. Columbia execs had high hopes for Bill as the next Bob Dylan, but a change in Columbia’s senior management just as Bill’s album was released in 1973 interrupted his career on the label. Bill formally resigned from The Pleasant Street Band in ’74 and, based out of Indianapolis, formed Bill Wilson and Friends. In 1983, Bill relocated to Florida but continued to make occasional appearances in Indiana, finally moving back “home” in 1986. He went on to record three independent albums, Talking to Stars, Made in the U.S.A., and Traction in the Rain. He remains best known, perhaps, for his moving Soldier’s Song, a reflection on the plight of returning Vietnam war veterans, a heartbreaking situation he knew well as a Vietnam war veteran himself.

Wilson died suddenly on Thanksgiving, November 25, 1993, at age 46, succumbing to massive heart failure. At the time, he was in Nashville, Tennessee, preparing to record a fourth independent album.

The insert to Bill Wilson’s demo album briefly describing each song