9/8/2023 0 Comments Muscle shoals sound studio![]() It was here that Hall first auditioned Arthur Alexander’s gospel quartet, The Heartstrings, about a year before Alexander cut “Sally Sue Brown.” Though it ultimately went nowhere, Stafford felt that Alexander had great potential as a singer and writer and signed him to their publishing arm, along with Penn and another local musician called Terry Thompson. But despite Stafford’s bohemian outlook being oddball for 1959, Joiner’s success had attracted a handful of songwriters to the area and it suited the musicians looking to use The Shoals as a launch pad to Music City. Unlike the romanticized warehouse lofts and art communities of more metropolitan cities, Florence was not a great source of pride for two near-broke musicians squatting above their buddy’s dad’s store. They would toil away at their songwriting, and sleep on cots when they needed to. It was here in Florence that Hall and Sherrill set up a ramshackle demo studio: soundproofing one room with egg cartons, stapling carpets and curtains onto the walls and windows, and fitting plexiglass between two of the rooms. His pitch to Hall and Sherrill was convincing, though, and it didn’t hurt that Stafford’s father had offered up three dilapidated rooms above the City Drug Store that he owned as a DIY live-work space. “Dan Penn once said that Tom reminded him of a bat with its wings folded up.” “Tom was born with a hunched back, and he liked to sit on a stool with his legs doubled back underneath him,” Hall recalls. ![]() ![]() Soon after Phillips cut the first side by Arthur Alexander, “Sally Sue Brown,” in 1960, James Joiner decided to focus on the family business and ride the royalty wave courtesy of folks who would cover “A Fallen Star,” as well as other cuts from his publishing roster – but not before introducing Hall and Sherrill to Tom Stafford.Īn eccentric local who managed two movie theaters in Florence, Stafford had caught the music publishing bug from Joiner and was was known to have a strange demeanor. They’d all regularly write and shop tunes to Joiner in the hopes of a $50 paycheck, and at times it would work out: Joiner published a few of their early songs, like “Sweet and Innocent" recorded in 1958 as a single by Roy Orbison, and then in 1970 by Donny Osmond. For all three, it was the financial promise of catching Nashville’s eye that attracted them. This regional success drew the attention of small town players like Hall and his friend Billy Sherrill – who played bass and sax in rival dance bands, The Country Pals and The Rhythm Swingers, and before joining forces for rock & roll band The Fairlanes – and the surly but ingenious singer-songwriter Dan Penn, who briefly fronted The Fairlanes. ![]() This was the beginning of many firsts for the “Muscle Shoals Sound.” Tune was one of the first Alabama-based publishing companies with a demo studio, and Joiner wrote the first big hit to come out of The Shoals, “A Fallen Star,” launching the singing career of local high school student Bobby Denton, who was later christened “The Singing Senator” during his 22-year run in the Alabama senate. In the same year that Presley released “Blue Suede Shoes,” James Joiner founded Tune Records and Tune Publishing in the back of his family-owned bus business in Florence. The success of singles such as Johnny Cash’s “Get Rhythm” and Elvis Presley’s “Blue Suede Shoes” are widely attributed to Jud’s flair for promotion. Jud himself founded the short-lived Judd record label in Florence and would go on to be a monstrous force on behalf of Sun Studios. Jud Phillips was the brother of Sam Phillips, who set up the legendary rockabilly and rock and roll incubator Sun Studios in Memphis, TN, where Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis cut their teeth. Hall wasn’t the first music business impresario in the region, though.
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