In preparing material for his fourth CD, David Seale joined creative forces with his longtime friend and Memphis-based author Richard Murff. The CD - titled One Last Hour - shares the themes and title of Murff’s latest novel. Seale views the dual-release concept as a fresh approach to melding the creative forms.
“It’s a really interesting concept,” Seale says, speaking to the Weekly’s Brent Thompson. “My friend, Richard Murff, started an online publishing company and published his first novel a little over a year ago. I said to him, ‘What if, as you are writing your next novel, you sent me some outlines, drafts and character sketches and I started to write songs inspired by that, recorded them, and we put them out at the same time as companion pieces.’ I got the idea from the Tom Petty album She’s The One. It says on the cover ‘Songs from and inspired by She’s The One.’ Two-thirds of those songs never show up in the movie, but seeing a screening of the film inspired him to write the songs and put them on the soundtrack. Led Zeppelin’s fascination with Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings trilogy is well-documented and they’ve written songs about that. But never had both things been created with the knowledge of each other to be released as companion pieces.”
On Sunday, August 17, Seale will hold a CD release event for One Last Hour at Rojo on Highland Avenue. The event begins at 7:30 p.m. and Murff will be on hand to sell and sign copies of the novel. Singer/songwriter Matthew Mayfield will close the evening with an 8:45 p.m. performance.
Though One Last Hour is Seale’s fourth solo release, the disc is his debut release for Warning Track Records. The local label, focusing on Birmingham-area artists, was founded by Seale and his brother, Michael.
“Michael and I had been talking for a couple of years about how great it would be to have a record label. We talked about it in the fantastical sense, the same way you might talk about owning a baseball team or something like that. We were at a Barons game when we decided to do it. We felt the situation was right because we have a lot of friends that are musicians and venues like Workplay, Bottletree and smaller clubs are encouraging original music. We felt it would be great to have a label that was just for Birmingham artists,” Seale says.
Earlier this year, Warning Track Records released its first compilation CD titled I’m Into Entertainment. The release features 11 tracks by local artists including Seale, Mayfield, Jon Vogel, Vulture Whale and Sparrow. Seale says the project came together through the interest of established relationships and new contacts alike.
“We basically called in every favor from every musician we knew that was in a pretty established band. We’ve known Wes McDonald and his band Vulture Whale for a long time. They’re one of those bands that’s so good that when you start watching them, you forget that you know them and start watching them like a fan. I’ve known Matthew Mayfield for a number of years and found out that [band] Moses Mayfield had dissolved and he was recording some stuff. Then, Michael and I did a [website] ‘Myspace Music’ search for Birmingham Bands and listened to 30 or 40 acts. We found the ones that were not already signed but were actively playing gigs and getting ‘Myspace’ hits. We sent out e-mails of inquiry and it started to come together,” he says.
As a label owner, Seale has aggressive yet realistic goals for Warning Track’s future.
“We view ourselves as a smaller version of the IRS label from the ’80s. We would like to find acts in Birmingham and give them some exposure. We’d like to put out a compilation every six months and we’ve already had a couple of bands ask to be on the next one. We know that, at some point, the birds will leave the nest and we’re fine with that. We feel that enhancing the city’s music scene makes it a more desirable place to live.” www.warningtrackrecords.com
