Will T. Massey, Jon Grossman

San Angelo, Texas, native Will T. Massey burst onto the contemporary music scene in 1991, at age 21, with a namesake major-label release that included help from Roy Bittan (Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band), Mike Campbell (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers) and Kenny Aronoff (John Mellencamp, John Fogerty).

National and European tours followed, with a music video on Country Music Television and an appearance on Austin City Limits.

“Like some West Texas Springsteen, Massey writes songs that… Show more give the commonplace events of life to high drama and delivers them with the grand gestures of a master performer,” gushed the Austin Chronicle.

Rolling Stone magazine called Will T. “an original voice from Texas,” and Time magazine opined that in his music, “the restless soul of Hank Williams matches up effortlessly with a rock ‘n’ roll heart.”

It was an auspicious industry beginning for a precocious songwriter who made his first album (Will T. distributed 150 cassette tapes of Pickin’, Poker and Pickup Trucks) while still in high school and followed it up with Kickin’ up Dust and Slow Study, with Lloyd Maines, Ponty Bone and Tish Hinojosa. Seemingly, overnight, he was catapulted from living in a barn and working as a janitor between gigs at Austin’s late, lamented Chicago House (Peg Miller, Glynda Cox) and similar venues in Dallas and Houston.

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