Sonobeat Artists
Roy Headrick
Singer-songwriter
Country-folk singer-songwriter Roy Headrick hails from Georgetown, Texas, 28 miles north of Austin, up Interstate 35. For years we believed Roy was the first composer to record a song demo album for Sonobeat’s publishing arm, Sonosong Music, but the last whose song demo album was actually pressed and distributed. But in February 2017, while making new high resolution cover scans of the master tape boxes in Sonobeat’s archives, we got a much closer look at the handwritten notes on one of Roy’s tape boxes and realized it says “November 28, 1969"” instead of “November 28, 1967”, as we’d previously believed. And, when we auditioned the tape, we got Roy’s verbal confirmation of the recording date. So, the elapsed time between recording Roy’s album and its release was far shorter than we had thought, although there’s still an unusual and unexplained two year gap. Roy’s album, titled Songs from the Catalog of Sonosong Music Company: Roy Headrick, Composer, featured 13 of his original compositions (Terry May, about whom there’s no information in the Sonobeat archives, was credited as co-writer of one song on the album), all sung by Roy self-accompanied on standard guitar. Roy’s material is primarily country-folk with one or two songs that could be considered Americana, and most are story-songs. All are heartfelt and feature clever lyrics. Later in his career, Roy turned exclusively to country music.
Sonobeat recorded Roy’s 1969 sessions at its home-based Western Hills Drive studio in northwest Austin. Sonobeat co-founders Bill Josey Sr. and Rim Kelley“Rim Kelley” was the pseudonym used by Sonobeat co-founder Bill Josey Jr. as a radio deejay in Austin, Texas, during the 1960s and as a Sonobeat producer from 1967 to 1970. engineered the sessions using Sonobeat’s Ampex AG-350 quarter-inch 2-track recorder. The recordings are simple and straightforward.
Sonobeat finally issued Roy’s album in 1971. Bill Sr. distributed copies from a limited run of 100 vinyl copies to Nashville country record labels, hoping that a song or two might be picked for a well-known artist to cover; however, there’s no indication in the Sonobeat archives that any national label or artist – country or otherwise – ever recorded any of Roy’s tunes. Like all of Sonobeat’s non-commercial demo album releases, Roy’s was issued in a plain white jacket with the album title rubber stamped in the center of the cover and wasn’t made available to the public. Despite using Sonobeat’s “Surrounding Sound Stereo” logo on the album label, the album was pressed only in a monaural version, as were all of Sonosong’s composer demo albums. Oddly, though, the master tapes in Sonobeat’s archives are stereo mixes.
While music was clearly Roy’s passion, in 1970 he began a 19 year career in the City of Austin’s planning department, retiring at the end of 1988. Today, in his mid-80s and still living in Georgetown, Roy continues to write and record new songs, still clever and heartfelt, and performs publicly from time to time. Many of Roy’s current recordings are available on SoundCloud and Apple Music and are easy to find by searching for “Roy Headrick”.
Songs from the Catalog of Sonosong Music Company:
Roy Headrick, Composer
Recording and release details
33-1/3 RPM monaural song demo album
Songs from the Catalog of Sonosong Music Company: Roy Headrick, Composer
Catalog number: WEJ-289M/WEJ-290M
Plain white jacket rubber stamped “SONGS FROM THE CATALOG OF SONOSONG MUSIC COMPANY” and “Roy Headrick, Composer”
Issued on unknown date in spring 1971
All songs composed by Roy Headrick except as indicated below
Side 1:
- That Old Dog • 5:15
- Peace of Mind • 3:01
- Wishing • 3:30
- Is God Dead? • 3:27
- Lonesome Eyes (assisted in composition by Terry May) • 3:46
- Little Blue Bird • 3:46
Side 2:
- Too Bad • 6:15
- You’re Jost a Dreamer • 3:53
- Leave Me • 2:18
- How Do You Do? • 5:20
- There’s Only One of You • 3:00
- Don’t Look at Me That Way • 5:20
- Is the Grass So Much Greener? • 3:00
Produced by Bill Josey Sr.
Engineered by Bill Josey Sr. and Rim Kelley
Recorded at Sonobeat’s Western Hills Drive studio, Austin, Texas, on November 28, 1969
Recorded using...
- AKG D707E dynamic and Sony ECM-22 electret condenser microphones
- Ampex AG-350 quarter-inch 2-track tape deck
- Custom 16-channel 4-bus mixing console
- Fairchild Lumiten 663ST stereo optical compressor
- Blonder-Tongue Audio Baton 9-band graphic equalizer
- Custom steel plate stereo reverb
- Ampex 681 tape stock
Approximately 100 copies manufactured
Lacquers mastered and vinyl copies pressed by Sidney J. Wakefield & Company, Phoenix, Arizona
Pressed only in a monaural version
Label blanks printed by Powell Offset Services, Austin, Texas
In the dead wax...
- Side 1: WEJ-289M 13898 HEC
- Side 2: WEJ-290M 13898 HEC
- “WEJ” at the beginning of the catalog number are Sonobeat co-founder Bill Josey Sr.’s initials. The tulip shape stamped next to the matrix number is the Sidney J. Wakefield logo. “HEC” are the initials of the Wakefield mastering engineer.
Listen!
Trivia
In July 1997, Roy had just been named president of the Georgetown Heritage Society. At the time, he and his wife were finishing up restoration of an 1870s working-class home on the edge of town. A city planner in nearby Austin, Roy was concerned that historically significant homes in Georgetown were being torn down. “Every old house we have is a treasure,” Roy’s quoted as saying in a July 8, 1997, Austin American-Statesman feature entitled Georgetown Trying to Preserve History.
In 1971, Roy contributed several poems to the Austin American-Statesman newspaper’s poetry page, including an adaptation of the lyrics from some of the songs that appeared on his Sonosong song demo album.