By 1974 Melvin Davis had become disillusioned and resentful towards the industry he had worked in for the past two decades. His frustration was mainly directed at record labels and the way they treated artists – stifling creativity, not promoting records, restricting artistic development, and most importantly, not paying adequately, if at all.

He reserved a special contempt for Invictus, who had made a great deal of money out of his talent, but, to this day, have never properly compensated him. Davis knew that the only sensible course of action open to him was to start his own label if he wanted to assume artistic, creative and financial control of his own destiny. “I knew enough about the business at that time and figured I could do it myself. I couldn’t screw myself after all.”

The Rock Mill label began operations in the summer of 1974 with the debut of the self penned “Double or nothing” by Mel Davis, and flourished throughout the 1970s and 1980s with further releases by Charisma, Liz Taylor, Davis himself, and Tim Murray (on the subsidiary Detroit Traks label). “Tim Murray and I used to go to the racetrack together. We had been working on ‘Thinking of you’ and were going through it together while we were watching the races, singing lines and so on. This lady must have overheard us ‘cause she came up to us and told us that she could sing.

We listened to her and were both quite impressed. It was Liz Taylor. She cut a couple of songs for me after that.” Some of Davis’ finest songs gained release on Rock Mill, particularly the uplifting “Roots of disco” and the beautiful “Saving myself for you” in 1978, and “Let love into your life” a year later. 

“Thinking of you” was co- written at the first meeting Davis ever had with Tim Murray, and was subsequently recorded by both of them, though only Murray’s version gained an official release. Davis’ version eventually saw the light of day in the 1990s on a Japanese cd “Love Truth and Victory” which featured all of his Rock Mill songs. 

music: "Double Or Nothing" - Melvin Davis (Rockmill)

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