On this day (November 13) in 1946, Ray Wylie Hubbard was born in Soper, Oklahoma. He started his career as a folk singer before forming a band called the Cowboy Twinkies, which may have been the first country punk band. Hubbard’s song catalog is deep and full of memorable songs. However, Jerry Jeff Walker helped put him on the map when he covered “Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mother” on his classic live album Viva Terlingua.
In the mid-1960s, a teenage Hubbard began playing folk music a resort in New Mexico with a group called Three Faces West. Eventually, they played gigs in Colorado and Texas. However, the group didn’t last. Then, in the early 1970s, he formed the Cowboy Twinkies. They played honky tonks and bars across the South until they finally landed a record deal.
“We’d come out and do country stuff, but we’d also do ‘Communication Breakdown’ and Hendrix’s version of the ‘Star-Spangled Banner.’ We would be doing ‘Silver Wings’ by Merle Haggard, and the guitar man would do the break in feedback,” Hubbard told D Magazine. “We’d either piss people off or they’d love us. You couldn’t ask for more than that,” he added. “Some people say we were the first country-punk band.”
Ray Wylie Hubbard Lands a Record Deal
Ray Wylie Hubbard and his Cowboy Twinkies cut a demo tape at a studio in Austin. The tape drew interest from several labels. In the end, he worked out a tenuous deal with Atlantic. “The damn thing was, everybody said they loved the tape. So, I said, ‘Great! Release it. Let’s go.’ And they said, ‘Oh, no, no, you cut it in Austin. Just hink what you can do with real studios and real musicians,” he recalled.
Atlantic sent Hubbard and the band to Muscle Shoals. However, he and the producer didn’t see eye to eye. One major sticking point was “Redneck Mother.” He wanted to go somewhere and record it live. The producer wanted him to record it in the studio. Then, they planned to dub in crowd noise from Bob Dylan’s Isle of Wight concert. “I told him he was missing the point. It wasn’t going to do any good to have 50,000 people yelling ‘Baaahhhb.’ You gotta hear beer bottles breaking,” Hubbard said. Then, the producers wanted Hubbard to use session players. He refused. Eventually, Atlantic released him from the contract.
Finally, his manager arranged another deal with Warner Reprise. Hubbard agreed to some compromises and cut an album with them. Ray Wylie Hubbard and the Cowboy Twinkies dropped in 1975.
At the time, he didn’t own a cassette player. So, he and the band piled into his van and put the tape in. Instead of the raw Texas energy they poured into the recording sessions, they heard string sections and backing vocals. “Man, it still hurts to think about it,” Hubbard said. “We couldn’t believe it. What had happened to that piece of our soul we’d worked on down in Austin? First we started laughing. Then, we just started crying, all of us.”
Since then, Hubbard has recorded for several labels, including Rounder, Mercury, Thirty Tigers, and Big Machine. He released his most recent album, Reel 2 Reel 4 Real (2026) on Wylieworld Music.
“Redneck Mother”
Ray Wylie Hubbard has written a long list of great songs. “Drunken Poet’s Dream,” “Dead Thumb King,” “Tell the Devil I’m Gettin’ There as Fast as I Can,” “Snake Farm,” and “Mother Blues” are among them. However, his best-known song is “Up Against the Wall Redneck Mother.”
“There was a lot of tension then,” Hubbard said about the late 1960s. “It’s hard to believe, now, but driving through West Texas or New Mexico at the time, you’d put your life in danger going into a service station.” The culture war of the era was simmering in the latter part of the decade. Then, Merle Haggard released “Okie from Muskogee” and cranked up the heat. It was an anthem to those who hated hippies as much as they loved Nixon, the Vietnam War, and their version of America.
Hubbard and some friends were jamming and drinking. When they ran out of beer, Hubbard went to a nearby store. Even late at night, his long hair drew glares from the few patrons. One woman asked him how he could call himself an American while sporting long hair. “I said I didn’t remember calling myself an American. I just came to get a case of beer,” he recalled. “So, we got into this little deal, and she said she was from Oklahoma. She had her son with her, a guy with a real burr haircut,” he explained.
Hubbard got his case of beer, went back to his buddies, picked up his guitar and started singing. What came out was roughly the first verse of “Redneck Mother.” He played the song during a set the next night. At the time, he saw it as a throwaway song. He never rehearsed it or played it the same way twice. However, it became so much more. For many, it was the resounding answer to Haggard and other mainstream country stars’ jingoistic right-wing anthems.
Jerry Jeff Walker Introduced Fans to Ray Wylie Hubbard.
One evening, he played the song with bassist Bob Livingston. Later, Livingston played it while working with Jerry Jeff Walker.
“The hippies started yelling, and the rednecks yelled back. People started fighting and pouring pitchers of beer on each other. So, Jerry Jeff said, ‘Hey! I better learn this song!’” Hubbard said.
Livingston later called Hubbard and asked him to write a second verse. Within the next few minutes, the song was finished. Then, Walker included it on his landmark album Viva Terlingua. On the album, Livingston introduces the song with “This is a song by Ray Wylie Hubbard.” This callout put more eyes on Hubbard and his work.
“It’s really weird. I’ve never had a hit record. I wrote this song that somebody else cut that was never a single and never got a lot of airplay. And it became this catalyst, the definitive progressive country thing,” Hubbard said. “It’s always been this bastard child. I say I wrote ‘Portales’ and Texas Is a State of Mind’ and other stuff. They say they wanna hear ‘Redneck Mother.’”
Ray Wylie remains one of the most interesting, talented, and underrated songwriters in the roots music world. “Redneck Mother” scarcely scratches the surface of what he has to offer.
Featured Image by Rick Kern/WireImage for Shock Ink
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Author: Clayton Edwards
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