Songwriter Fred Koller on Hiatt, Healey, Prine, and the Importance of Books

Fred Koller is closing in on a half-century of success as a songwriter. From early cuts with an unsigned Chris LeDoux, to material for Kenny Chesney, to a song for radio comedy icon Dr. Demento, Koller is responsible for dozens of songs by dozens of recording artists. His biggest cut may be the song he co-wrote with John Hiatt, “Angel Eyes,” which helped launch the career of the late Canadian blues/rock guitarist/vocalist Jeff Healey.

“I’ve known John Hiatt since about 1974,” Koller told American Songwriter by phone from Nashville. “I had just come back to Nashville from California and John had come back from there also. We wrote four or five things in a very short period, most of which have been recorded here and there. We were a couple of single guys trying to write a love song we thought would appeal [to the women]. ‘Angel Eyes’ was a positive love song that definitely came from personal experience for me, as I’m sure it was for John.”

“We couldn’t get it cut, we basically pitched it to everyone who owned a guitar. John and I were writing for Bug Music at the time, and they put together a selection of songs to send to Jeff Healey, who no one really knew anything about. They sent him [Hiatt’s] ‘Confidence Man’ and ‘Angel Eyes.’”

Healey cut both of those songs, and “Angel Eyes” became a hit for him in America, and also charted in Canada and Australia. The song had actually been recorded by New Grass Revival on their final album before Healey cut it. And, as proof that a good song never dies, it became a number one record in Australia in 2004 when it was cut by Australian Idol alum Paulini.

Koller also was also the co-writer with John Prine of Prine’s novelty classic “Let’s Talk Dirty in Hawaiian.” “I can go on YouTube and watch 100 people perform ‘Let’s Talk Dirty in Hawaiian,’ he said. “That’s the only song we wrote together. I told John we’d helped mankind as much as we could. It was covered on the Prine tribute album [Dirty Hearts & Broken Windows, recorded by Those Darlins], and by [Japanese ukulele duo] Petty Booka. It still pops up every now and then.”

What folks outside of Nashville don’t know about Koller, though, is that he’s also the owner of thousands of books, most of which can be found in his West Nashville bookstore, Rhino Booksellers. He opened the store’s original location in South Nashville in 2000, and it became part of the local culture. “I’ve always been an avid reader,” Koller said. “It’s always been my favorite form of escape. I like well-crafted fiction and non-fiction, and short stories – I was a huge fan of Raymond Carver and those kinds of people. And books-on-tape just don’t do it for me, I really love the printed word.”

“There are books that I wish more songwriters would read,” he continued, “books that are real essential for songwriters. Like Richard Hugo, a poet who’s passed away from the northeast, who has a book called The Triggering Town: Lectures and Essays on Poetry and Writing. And I’d like to have more people actively coming into the bookstore, because there’s just so much inspiration there. I have about 75,000 titles right now.” The store has been closed for several months because of the pandemic. “I couldn’t take [the books] off the shelves to decontaminate, so I decided to wait.”

Of course, it stands to reason that Koller himself would be an author, and he is, with his book How to Pitch and Promote Your Songs, as well as Goin’ Gone, a songbook with some of his best-known tunes of the ‘80s, including “Angel Eyes.”