Bill:
You sound like a nice person. I actually found this site accidentally while looking for Mr. James' website. I had lost contact with him a few years back and just wanted to see what he was doing and to with him a Merry Christmas. I met him at an industry conference where he was the speaker. Myself and several others got to play him some of our song demo'. He liked mine and kept it. Later we go together and decided that he would produce me. I had already recorded some of those low cost demos but my husband and I felt that I should do it up right. So I did. I did a session in Nashville and a session in Florida. Mr. James played my recordings for people in the music industry and we got a couple of companies interested. We went to NY for a meeting with a label and we also went to CA for a meeting with another label. I didn't like NY or NY didn't like me but anyway the CA company seemed excited. We got back home and Mr. James called to say that the CA company wanted to hear more material. We went back into the studio and recorded more. We sent those off to CA and about a month later Mr. James calls saying that they wanted to meet with me again. This time they were paying. My husband at the time was starting to think we were wasting our time so he refused to go. Mr. James and I met up in CA and the next day we went to the label meeting. Most of the people in the company office seemed to know Mr. James pretty well and this meeting went great and I came back with a letter stating that they were interested in signing me. The last day that I was there I got a call at the hotel saying that my father had died in and automobile accident. So the excitement was hampered greatly. A couple of weeks after I got back I found out really why my husband at the time didn't want to go back to CA. I found out that I wasn't the only woman in his life and I was destroyed. I talked to Mr. James and he tried to keep buying me time with the label until I could get straightened out. I eventually had a breakdown. All was not lost though. Through all of this I found myself walking closer with God who saw me through it all. Later God and I got me back together, I got heavily involved with my church. I'm now married to a wonderful Christian man and have two children. My record deal offer was 6 years, 2 children and 28 pounds ago. I really wanted to be a pop star but another path was chosen for me. Contemporary Christian music is not out of the question though. Sorry for the rambling. Sometimes I just have the need to testify. Anyway back to your question, I did pay Mr. James for his services and he did not come cheap but it was money well spent. I had recorded cheap demos prior and got no results at all. Bill I'm not big on these type of things. As a matter of fact this is my first time to ever participate. I was just answering someones question about someone I once knew. Merry Christmas!