Editing Bob Wills (section)

===Swing era===
In December 1942, after several band members had left the group, and as World War II raged, Wills joined the [[United States Army|Army]] at the age of 37,<ref>{{cite magazine|date=December 26, 1942|title=Bob Wills Joins the Army|page=18|magazine=[[Billboard (magazine)|Billboard]]|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZQwEAAAAMBAJ&q=Bob+Wills+Joins+the+Army&pg=PT17|url-status=live|access-date=2013-03-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160505143756/https://books.google.com/books?id=ZQwEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PT17&dq=Bob+Wills+Joins+the+Army&hl=en&sa=X&ei=SSJLUbDoDI322AXs-oGYCw&ved=0CDoQ6AEwAA|archive-date=May 5, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|author=Townsend|first=Charles R.|title=Handbook of Texas Online – Wills, James Robert|url=https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/wills-james-robert|url-status=live|access-date=April 14, 2021|website=Texas Handbook Online|publisher=|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200930194953/https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/wills-james-robert |archive-date=September 30, 2020 }}</ref> but received a [[Military discharge|medical discharge]] in 1943.<ref name="bobwills">{{cite web|title=History|url=http://www.bobwills.com/history.html|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100421101538/http://www.bobwills.com/history.html|archive-date=April 21, 2010|access-date=2010-05-02|publisher=bobwills.com|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Bob Wills : Biography|url=http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/wills_bob/bio.jhtml|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061202163433/http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/wills_bob/bio.jhtml|archive-date=December 2, 2006|access-date=2010-05-02|publisher=CMT.com}}</ref> After leaving the Army, Wills moved to Hollywood and began to reorganize the Texas Playboys.<ref>''San Antonio Rose''. page 229</ref> He became an enormous draw in Los Angeles, where many of his fans had relocated during the [[Great Depression]] and World War II in search of jobs. Monday through Friday, the band played the noon hour timeslot over [[KLAC|KMTR-AM]] (now KLAC) in Los Angeles. They also played regularly at the Mission Beach Ballroom in San Diego.<ref name="Bob Wills 1976. page 241">''San Antonio Rose: The Life and Music of Bob Wills''. Charles R. Townsend. 1976. University of Illinois. p. 241. {{ISBN|0-252-00470-1}}.</ref>

He commanded enormous fees playing dances there, and began to make more creative use of electric guitars to replace the big horn sections the Tulsa band had boasted. For a very brief period in 1944, the Wills band included 23 members,<ref name="bobwills" /> and around mid-year, he toured Northern California and the Pacific Northwest with 21 pieces in the orchestra.<ref>''San Antonio Rose: The Life and Music of Bob Wills''. Charles R. Townsend. 1976. University of Illinois. p. 350. {{ISBN|0-252-00470-1}}.</ref> ''Billboard'' reported that Wills out-grossed [[Harry James]], [[Benny Goodman]], "[[The Dorsey Brothers|both Dorsey brothers bands]], et al." at Civic Auditorium in Oakland, California, in January 1944.<ref>''Billboard'' February 5, 1944. Vol. 56, No. 6. p. 62.</ref>

Wills and His Texas Playboys began their first cross-country tour in November 1944, and appeared at the [[Grand Ole Opry]] on December 30, 1944. According to Opry policy, drums and horns were considered pop instruments, inappropriate to country music. The Opry had two Western swing bands on its roster, led by [[Pee Wee King]] and [[Paul Howard (musician)|Paul Howard]]. Neither was allowed to use their drummers at the Opry. Wills' band at the time consisted of two fiddlers, two bass fiddles, two electric guitars, electric steel guitar, and a trumpet. Wills's then-drummer was Monte Mountjoy, who played in the Dixieland style. Wills battled Opry officials and refused to perform without his drummer. An attempt to compromise by keeping Mountjoy behind a curtain collapsed when Wills had his drums placed front and center onstage at the last minute.<ref>''Southwest Shuffle: Pioneers of Honky Tonk, Western Swing, and Country Jazz'' by Rich Kienzle p 255</ref>

In 1945, Wills' dances were drawing larger crowds than dances put on by [[Tommy Dorsey]] and Benny Goodman. That year, he lived in both Santa Monica and Fresno, California.<ref name="bobwills" /> In 1947, he opened the Wills Point nightclub in Sacramento, California, and continued touring the Southwest and Pacific Northwest from Texas to Washington. In [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]], he broadcast shows over [[KFBK (AM)|KFBK]], a station whose reach encompassed much of the American West.<ref>Gerald W. Haslam. ''Workin' Man Blues: Country Music In California''. University of California Press. 1999. p. 82; {{ISBN|0-520-21800-0}}.</ref> Wills was in such high demand that venues would book him even on weeknights, because they knew the show would still be a draw.<ref name="Bob Wills 1976. page 241" />

During the postwar period, [[KGO (AM)|KGO]] radio in San Francisco syndicated a Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys show recorded at the [[Fairmont San Francisco|Fairmont Hotel]]. Many of these recordings survive today as the Tiffany Transcriptions and are available on CD.<ref name="WSJ"/> They show off the band's strengths significantly, in part because the group was not confined to the three-minute limits of 78 RPM discs. On April 3, 1948, Wills and the Texas Playboys appeared for the inaugural broadcast of the ''[[Louisiana Hayride]]'' on [[KWKH]], broadcasting from the Municipal Auditorium in Shreveport, Louisiana.

Wills and the Texas Playboys played dances throughout the West to more than 10,000 people every week. They held dance attendance records at [[Jantzen Beach]] in [[Portland, Oregon]]; Santa Monica, California; [[Klamath Falls, Oregon]]; and California's Oakland Auditorium, where they drew 19,000 people over two nights.<ref>''San Antonio Rose: The Life and Music of Bob Wills''. Charles R. Townsend. 1976. University of Illinois. p. 252. {{ISBN|0-252-00470-1}}.</ref> Wills recalled the early days of what became known as Western swing music in a 1949 interview: "Here's the way I figure it. We sure not tryin' to take credit for swingin' it."<ref>{{cite web|author=A. Schneider|title=Honky Tonks, Hymns and the Blues|url=https://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/2003/honkytonks|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130914045523/http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/2003/honkytonks/|archive-date=September 14, 2013|access-date=2010-05-02|publisher=NPR|df=mdy-all}}</ref>

Still a binge drinker, Wills became increasingly unreliable in the late 1940s, causing a rift with Tommy Duncan (who bore the brunt of audience anger when Wills's binges prevented him from appearing). It ended when he fired Duncan in the fall of 1948.{{Citation needed|date=April 2021}}