Like a King

Bob Hate | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 1, 2003)
• Original Release Date: July 1, 2003
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Moonguy
• ASIN: B0000A3KY6
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,317,642 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

About the Artist

Born William Robert Simmons in Bossier City, Louisiana in 1958. Young Will grew up quietly with his parents who owned the Crystal Whip, a decades-famous rock club that was home to countless 70s rock and blues acts.

When Will was 17, he started his first band, Grand Theft Otto. They played blues and southern rock at the Whip on weeknights. But in 1977 he left home to start college in Reno, Nevada. Instead of attending classes, Will began playing open mic nights and working on his own songs.

It was in 1985, however, that the Bob Hate saga really began. While his current band was stranded at a rest area near the Texas border, Chet Hix, a full-blooded Choctaw Indian, pulled alongside offering battery cables and a jump.

Within six weeks Hate and Hix had started a new group, the so-called Eddy band.

Most of the story after that is well chronicled. The band went nationwide in 1991. The money poured in. The boys bought houses that made MC Hammer’s place look like a toolshed. They broke up after a vicious on-stage argument in 1994.

Bob continued to tour and record with a variety of bands throughout the 1990s. His last known public performance was in San Antonio in late 1998. He finished with a mesmerizing twelve minute version of the early classic, "Swimming."

"He kissed me," one fan said. "He kissed all the girls and made them cry."

This posthumous greatest hits collection was already in progress when a number of unreleased recordings came to light. The markings suggested they were recorded in winter 1999, about the same time that word of his death shocked fans. But, the digital compression ratio on all of these news discs was too high for pre-2000 equipment. The recordings had to have been made after his death.

"Bob Hate lives, isn’t that what they used to say," former bassist Buck Rudolph said in an interview this year. "He’s in me, in his fans. He’s in the old songs and the new."

So, we’re left with this document. 15 songs, 8 of them never heard before, their recording date a mystery, their creation just another part of the myth.

Four wheels, Two lives, One more last ride.

Bob Hate lives.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Solid, November 26, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Like a King (Audio CD)

Solid effort, excellent songs. Maybe a real rhythm section would beef it up, but the disc is a must-have.

Some brilliant lyrics

4.0 out of 5 stars midtempo rocking and beautiful, July 8, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Like a King (Audio CD)

Like a King does not disappoint. It's solid from track one to track fifteen. My fave cuts are Pontiac (with that saxaphone) and Bad in my Car, a story about love on the highway (not love in an elevator, but just like it.)

Bob sounds like he belongs in the 70's, rocking with the classic rock icons. But the disc is bright and well mixed, full of cool lyrics like this one: "you left me for a dumber guy." Who else says that?

Rock on, brother Bob.