Return To Nashville
In April 1985, Loveless felt her marriage to Terry Lovelace was ending (they eventually divorced amicably in 1986). She contacted her brother Roger to help her get back to Nashville. After being in the rock 'n' roll scene for so long she felt completely out of the country-music loop but wanted to sing country music again. Roger Ramey helped his sister cut a five-song demo tape, one of them being a rough cut of her self-penned song "I Did", which Loveless first wrote as a teenager, then later included on her first album. Roger Ramey then began to spread the word around about her talent. She and her brother disagreed about including "I Did" on the demo tape. Loveless didn't believe the song was good enough, but Roger argued that it would be what got her a contract. Once the demo was finished, Roger started trying to get her a recording contract with a major label in Nashville.
Roger Ramey sent the demo tape out to every major label in Nashville, and was met with a solid wall of rejection by them all. After a month of not getting anywhere, out of desperation to help his sister, he decided to take a chance with MCA Nashville. MCA, being the industry leader at the time was his first choice of labels. Taking a cassette of the five song demo of Loveless, Roger bluffed his way past the receptionist of Tony Brown, the head of A&R (Artist & Repertoire – in charge of finding and developing new talent) by pretending to be someone else who was late for an appointment.
As soon as they met, Roger told Brown him he had the "best girl singer to ever come to Nashville". Tony Brown said he'd give Roger 30 seconds to sell him, and he quickly played the tape of Patty singing "I Did". Brown listened to the entire five-song tape, and asked Roger to leave it with him so he could play it for some other execs and get back to him. Roger refused and told Brown that he wanted a commitment that day, and if he didn't want her on MCA, he knew another label that did.
With Roger Ramey waiting in his office, Brown took the tape to Jimmy Bowen, President of MCA Nashville at the time. Hearing the tape, Bowen wasn't impressed with Loveless, but told Brown to go ahead and sign her, but only to a short-term, singles-only recording contact.
Read more about this topic: Patty Loveless, Biography
Famous quotes containing the words return to and/or return:
“To save the theatre, the theatre must be destroyed, the actors and actresses must all die of the plague. They poison the air, they make art impossible. It is not drama that they play, but pieces for the theatre. We should return to the Greeks, play in the open air: the drama dies of stalls and boxes and evening dress, and people who come to digest their dinner.”
—Eleonora Duse (1858–1924)
“I can neither return your love nor dismiss it.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)