[7] Roy Dea produced the single, "The Hurt Won't Go Away" for Margie Hendrix which was released on Mercury in 1967.
It was his friend and fellow record producer Jerry Kennedy who convinced him to come back to Mercury.
[10][11] According to Kennedy, Dea was one of the few people he felt he could trust to handle the artists in his name and would be involved in both signing and producing country and r&b acts for the label.
[12] It was mentioned in the Record World article that Dea would be expanding the Mercury roster himself as well as taking on some of the production of the prformers that Kennedy was handling.
It was around 1972 that Hall took Rodriguez to the office of Roy Dea and Jerry Kennedy to audition for the producers at Mercury's Nashville division.
[14] According to the alancackett.com website, when Rodriguez was singing "I Can’t Stop Loving You", he broke into a Spanish verse which resulted in Dea being overcome by it.