Ned Doerr:  

s a group, which meant we learned, as teenagers, to put our personal feelings aside, to accept criticism and to work together; all lessons I still use today. The 70’s hit and so did I with a new band, Flight, an 8-piece horn band. You bet I got the idea from Chicago Transit Authority (later Chicago) and Blood Sweat and Tears. They had an incredible sound, a combination of rock, jazz, and funk and I loved it. We had quite the luck playing dances, bars, concerts, and fairs. In 1973 we caught the attention of Motown producer/writer, Hank Cosby. He loved our sound and had some great ideas. One of the ideas was for us to record a new song that was a little ahead of its time. Well, it was too different for our singer who exclaimed, “I’m not singing that crap.” So he didn’t, hence neither did we, but another group did and I’m sure you’ll even know the song…….. “War.” OK, so you live and learn. That comment broke up the band and I ended up working in the studio for the next few years recording commercials, demos, and whatever else I could. In 1975 Flight re-formed. We had some new faces mixed in with the old, but we still possessed the same distinctive high-energy sound. After a few months of playing the clubs in Detroit we landed a gig as the opening act for Eddie Kendricks first solo tour. What a blast! Also during this time, Motown relocated from Detroit to California. A number of Motown people refused to move so they stayed in Detroit and formed their own company, “Hit Records”. For the next three years I worked on a number of recording sessions, became a co-writer on Hit’s only release, the top-10 disco hit, “Disco Judge”, and along with the band, performed as the backup band for the other label artists. Our own recording career had been progressing nicely and we were in the middle of laying down instrument tracks on our first album when the company ran out of money and went belly up. With that so did the album and the band! I spent the next few years running away from disco, punk, and rap. I was really trying to find some music that made sense. Then someone handed me an album and told me I should check it out. The album was Alabama’s first and it just blew me away! Then I checked out country radio, as well as TNN videos and found that I just couldn’t get enough. The history, tradition, young artists, old artists, fans; it literally transformed my musical soul. I ended up spending most of my free nights in front of the radio or TV jamming and learning as much music as I could. I was still performing with a variety of people in 1982 when I decided to form a country trio with two close friends of mine. The really cool thing for me was that we all had the same goals both musically and vocally. We happily spent hours writing all of our own vocal and instrumental arrangements for every single tune, cover or original that we performed. Now you have to understand that the Detroit area was not really conducive to developing and supporting country music in the early 80’s, so to keep the peace we compromised. We’d play the “Pop” hits of the day but with a country style. This was a hit with us as well as the audience and it kept us working!! That brings us all the way up to 1986 and the formation of The Red Ryder Band. As you have read in the Band’s Bio we have been blessed with some strong support from both the Nashville and Detroit music community and things are progressing nicely. Currently we're in the process of working out the final details with Dave Pomeroy on producing our debut CD.".