David Mead

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David Mead in concert

David Mead is an American singer-songwriter known for crafting songs in classic pop music style and possessing a uniquely high voice. Born in 1973 in Syosset, New York to David Mead Sr. and Sheryll Mead, he moved often during his childhood, mostly residing within the Southern United States. He eventually settled in Nashville, Tennessee, where he spent the early part of his career in bands such as Verdant Green and Blue Million.

Mead eventually became a guitarist and backup vocalist with Nashville-based band Joe, Marc’s Brother. The founding members of that band amicably encouraged Mead to pursue a solo career due to differing artistic visions. Reluctantly, he began to perform on his own around Nashville, eventually gaining enough notoriety to attract the attention of his current manager, Kip Krones. Kip shopped a demo of Mead's songs to several record labels, including RCA Records, the label that signed him in 1998 after he performed solo with a guitar in the company's offices.

Mead moved to New York in 1997, recording what would become his 1999 debut release, The Luxury of Time. The album garnered much critical acclaim, engendering comparisons to Lennon-McCartney and Paul Simon, but sold only moderately. The crafted sound of his songs juxtaposed with the more ephemerally commercial hit songs of the time. This was a source of humor in a biography found on the now-defunct RCA website for Mead, a tongue-in-cheek confidential "Marketing Strategy Bulletin" positing marketing angles such as reinventing Mead as a "Latin Heartthrob" or arranging for him to perform on Ozzfest.

Belief in Mead's potential led to RCA releasing a second album, 2001's Mine and Yours, produced by Adam Schlesinger of the band Fountains of Wayne. Another critical success and moderate seller, Mine and Yours allowed Mead to record a third album, produced by Stephen Hague, which was never put out by RCA as a result of Mead being released from his recording contract when RCA's corporate parent BMG merged with Sony Music Entertainment in 2004.

Mead returned to Nashville, where he met his wife, visual artist Natalie Cox Mead, and began work on another album, Indiana, with cellist and producer David Henry. This album was much more spare and intimate than his prior offerings, and was released in 2004 by Nettwerk, a Canadian record label. The next year, Mead was working on a follow up album for Nettwerk, Tangerine, when the label released him from his contract in an ironic replay of his RCA experience.

Having retained rights to the recordings he made with Stephen Hague when he was signed to RCA, Mead released a portion of these tracks in the form of 2005's Wherever You Are EP through Eleven Thirty Records. The EP was received with flowing praise by reviewers, cementing Mead's reputation as an accomplished songwriter and critical favorite.

In 2006 Mead formed Tallulah Media for the purpose of releasing Tangerine, the most expansive and adventurous work in his catalog. Produced by Brad Jones, the album incorporates a dizzying variety of instruments into accomplished arrangements that effortlessly support Mead's reflections on the oft-neglected topic of marriage.