The G.E.D. Soul Story
G.E.D. Soul Records
was formed in the Summer of 2007 by Nick DeVan and Dave Singleton in
Murfreesboro, TN. But the story really began a couple years before that
at Middle Tennessee State University where DeVan and Singleton had a
weekly deep funk radio show called the G.E.D. Soul Revue. The radio
show necessitated the acquisition of countless hard funk and soul
records, all of which were consumed in a manner befitting a soul music
junky trying to scratch an unreachable itch.
This habit continued
unchecked for about three years when the idea to press a funk 45 of
their own was bandied about. Nick, who engineers and mixes all of the
label’s releases had recently acquired a couple old tape machines which
were put to use rather quickly to capture the rough and tough sounds
that would comprise the first 45 from a fictitious group called the
Grips. Drums and bass were recorded through a single microphone which
was run through a fender reverb guitar amp to a 4 track cassette
recorder which was then bounced to a 1/4″ tape deck for overdubs and
then promptly smashed down to a 1/8″ Teac 2 track reel to reel. It was a
gritty record for sure, but by no means was it the grittiest.
Dee Adams, joined the
picture at precisely this moment as he leant his masterfully powerful
vocals to the A-Side, “Tennessee Strut” and the record was sent out into
the wild with absolutely no fan fare. But little by little, word began
to spread about the gritty little yellow 7″ and before too long it was
decided that Dee, or DeRobert, needed his own band. So the three
friends cobbled together many incarnations of the Half-Truths and the
rest is history.
In more recent years, G.E.D.
Soul’s line up has grown to include other Nashville based funk &
soul acts including AJ & The Jiggawatts, the Coolin’ System, Magic
in Threes, and more.
G.E.D. Soul is an independent
musician owned record label. Operated on a shoestring budget, almost
everyone involved juggles an intense love for music with the daily grind
of a menial day job. Some say that type of daily struggling effects the
music, we think so, in a positive way. When you purchase a record, CD,
or download an MP3 from G.E.D. Soul, you are directly supporting a group
of hardcore do-it-yourselfers who live and breath soul music and want
nothing more than to continue bringing it to your ears, one record at a
time.
Link can be found here:
