In the summer of 2005 Doyle went to Nashville under the producer Harry Hinde (the man who discovered Shania Twain !) There he recorded six tracks at Emerald Studios. Doyle co-wrote a couple of songs with Denis Morgan (who had previously written dozens of massive hits including “Knew You Were Waitin” performed by George Michael and Aretha Franklin. The co-writes were ‘Angel’ and ‘God’s Gold’. This material is pending release and distribution as Doyle would like to mass distribute the London 2005 recordings first and provide these additional Nashville recordings to interested fans.
The recordings included a shorter version of Doyle’s epic album closer ‘ the Second Coming” as well as versions of ‘Sold’ and ‘Survival’.
Doyle selected Denis Morgan’s ‘ Down Life’s Ever Winding Rd’ as his Nashville title track.
Magic was sprinkled on the live recordings by an all-star line up of musicians including no less than Elvis Presley’s former guitarist who was responsible for the licks on ‘Suspicious Minds’ and ‘In the Ghetto’. Doyle said of him ‘ I didn’t really know what to say to him, I was sort of scared, it was too much, Elvis was my idol as a kid”.
Additionally, Doyle had some other pretty awesome musicians from the Motown fraternity and Van Morrison.
The backing vocals featured Angela Cox from Australia, Teresa Collier, Scat Springs, Greg Edmondson who were led by the “best singer in the world bar none” Marcia Ware. Doyle said of them “ they were absolutely awesome, check out their backing vocals, these guys singing was a sight to behold, I really look forward to working with them again”.
The project took some eight weeks over two trips, Mick having a few singing lessons with the top Dixie Chicks vocal coach, Renee Grant Williams. “She had a very weird cat, and as a cat lover, take it from me, the cat was weird’ said Doyle.
“I spent the whole eight weeks wondering why Harry was so precise with time. He would say – I’ll meet you in 13 minutes etc, strange. I ate too many steaks and spent many a night mesmerized at the various Nashville live musicians. I saw two guys playing that totally blew me away one night. They did this circular act around their instruments playing about 200 different songs from memory at breakneck speed, it was unbelievable. It made me realise that I have nothing but personality and energy, musicianship is all theirs”.
Doyle checked out of Nashville for Memphis where he met the inevitable Robert Johnson the Flying Mojo from Memphis Music Limited. Here Doyle also saw awesome Florida based band The Spoon Benders for the first time and was mesmerized again. Johnson (who once auditioned for the Rolling Stones and has a massive guitar collection) hooked Doyle up with a couple of New York music consultants, a lawyer named David Glinert and a freelance record company consultant named Lou Mann. Doyle signed a six-month Consultancy agreement with Messrs Glinert and Mann whereupon they introduced Doyle to the music of Phil Roy. Doyle loved Phil Roy’s music.
Doyle and Johnson also found time to write and record the beginnings of a track called “Cheerio”, about a guy who leaves the UK for the US and everyone he meets keeps trying to take the Brit (Cheerio) out of him”. Apparently, the recording studio was opposite a café owned by U2, so Doyle went in their for a cup of tea. “Well, I have always like U2’s music, so I thought it only right to go and drink tea in their café”.
London to Nashville to New York back to London.