John Webb McMurry (born May 19, 1954), known as Webb Wilder, is an American country,

rock & roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock 'n' roll, or rock 'n roll) is a genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It originated from African-American music such as jazz, rhythm an ...

singer, guitarist and actor.

Early life

McMurry was born in

Hattiesburg Hattiesburg is a city in the U.S. state of Mississippi, located primarily in Forrest County (where it is the county seat and largest city) and extending west into Lamar County. The city population was 45,989 at the 2010 census, with the populat ...

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

. He started playing guitar at the age of 12 and was playing in bands when he was 14. Webb Wilder(John Webb McMurry)'s aunt was

Lillian McMurry Lillian Shedd McMurry (December 30, 1921 – March 18, 1999) was one of the earliest American female record producers and owner of Trumpet Records. She was influential in the development of blues music, particularly through her recordings of Sonn ...

, the founder of

Trumpet Records Trumpet Records was an American record company founded by Lillian McMurry in Jackson, Mississippi in 1951. Although it existed for only four years, it was influential. History The goal of Trumpet Records was to record musicians from the Mississip ...

. She was a mentor to McMurray and gave advice as he started in the music industry.

Career

With his groups like

The Drapes ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

The Beatnecks ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

The Nashvegans ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

, Wilder combines the straight-ahead

with surf guitar of

the Ventures The Ventures are an American instrumental rock band formed in Tacoma, Washington, in 1958, by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle. The band, which was a quartet for most of its existence, helped to popularize the electric guitar across the world during the ...

and

twang Twang is an onomatopoeia originally used to describe the sound of a vibrating bow string after the arrow is released.Hensleigh Wedgwood, ''A Dictionary of English Etymology: Q - Z'' (1865), p. 433. By extension it applies to the similar vibrati ...

Duane Eddy Duane Eddy (born April 26, 1938) is an American rock and roll guitarist. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, he had a string of hit records produced by Lee Hazlewood, which were noted for their characteristically "twangy" sound, including "Rebel- ...

, drawing on the feel of

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

, R&B,

country A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. It may be a sovereign state or make up one part of a larger state. For example, the country of Japan is an independent, sovereign state, while the ...

rockabilly Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music. It dates back to the early 1950s in the United States, especially the Southern United States, South. As a genre it blends the sound of Western music (North America), Western music ...

and

film noir Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of American ' ...

. His sound incorporated influence from

Americana music Americana (also known as American roots music) is an amalgam of American music formed by the confluence of the shared and varied traditions that make up the musical ethos of the United States, specifically those sounds that are emerged from the ...

as well as from the

British Invasion The British Invasion was a cultural phenomenon of the mid-1960s, when rock and pop music acts from the United Kingdom and other aspects of British culture became popular in the United States and significant to the rising "counterculture" on b ...

. Wilder said that his music was progressive country. He has been signed to major labels and worked with independent labels. He has also hosted a radio show for Sirius Radio. Webb Wilder appeared as an actor in

Peter Bogdanovich Peter Bogdanovich (July 30, 1939 – January 6, 2022) was an American director, writer, actor, producer, critic, and film historian. One of the "New Hollywood" directors, Bogdanovich started as a film journalist until he was hired to work on R ...

's 1993 film ''

The Thing Called Love ''The Thing Called Love'' is a 1993 American comedy-drama film directed by Peter Bogdanovich and starring Samantha Mathis as Miranda Presley, a young musician who tries to make it big in Nashville. River Phoenix, Dermot Mulroney and Sandra Bullo ...

''. Review: The Thing Called Love
Retrieved 5 December 2022 As of 2020, he was an afternoon-shift disc jockey for

Murfreesboro Murfreesboro is a city in and county seat of Rutherford County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 152,769 according to the 2020 census, up from 108,755 residents certified in 2010. Murfreesboro is located in the Nashville metropol ...

-based radio station

WMOT WMOT is a public radio station serving the metropolitan Nashville, Tennessee market. Licensed to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, it is owned by the Middle Tennessee State University, located in nearby Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and it broadcasts an Ame ...

Discography

Albums

Charted singles

Filmography

* ''Paradise Park'' (1991) * ''Corn Flicks'' (1992) consisted of three short films, including: :*''Webb Wilder Private Eye'' ::* Grand prize winner of the Texas Union National Student Film Competition ::* Aired repeatedly on the

A&E Network A&E is an American basic cable network, the flagship television property of A&E Networks. The network was originally founded in 1984 as the Arts & Entertainment Network, initially focusing on fine arts, documentaries, television drama, dramas, and ...

and the

USA Network USA Network (simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. It was originally launched in 1977 as Madison ...

show Night Flight :*''Horror Hayride'' ::* Won Silver Hugo Award at the

Chicago International Film Festival The Chicago International Film Festival is an annual film festival held every fall. Founded in 1964 by Michael Kutza, it is the longest-running competitive film festival in North America. Its logo is a stark, black and white close up of the comp ...

::* Awarded three stars by the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...

'' ::* Presented at the New Orleans Film & Video and Dallas Video Festivals :*''Aunt Hallie'' * ''The Thing Called Love'' (1993) Ned * ''Pueblo Sin Suerte'' (2002) Reb * ''Born to be Wilder'' (2005) Himself * ''Scattergun'' (2007) * ''Webb Wilder Amazing B-Picture Shorts'' (2009)

References

External links

*
The ORIGINAL Webb Wilder website

WEBB-TV

* *

Complete discography from AllMusic Complete may refer to: Logic * Completeness (logic) * Completeness of a theory, the property of a theory that every formula in the theory's language or its negation is provable Mathematics * The completeness of the real numbers, which implies t ...

Biography from the Houston Press

Hunter Goatley's Webb Wilder Archive

Webb Wilder interview about Mississippi Moderne
1954 births American rock musicians Musicians from Hattiesburg, Mississippi Living people Blind Pig Records artists American radio personalities {{US-rock-musician-stub