NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Country Rewind Records who brings unreleased traditional Country music into the contemporary era has released Merle Travis, Sixteen Tons. The new music is being distributed by Select-O-Hits and available to order on Country Rewind Records website as well as streaming and download to include Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Music, Pandora and more. Merle Travis, Sixteen Tons is available on all digital music platforms here.
Merle Travis – Sixteen Tons is on the Country Rewind Records – Western Heritage Collection. Produced by Rex Allen Jr. for Boxer Productions with Thomas Gramuglia as Executive Producer: This recording of Merle Travis’s music is one that even his most ardent fans never expected to hear, but now these tracks have been saved for posterity.
“The talent that the man had has been greatly overlooked in my opinion, until now,” says the album’s producer, Rex Allen Jr. “With this album, the world will really see what a huge influential talent he was.” These tracks were ‘reimagined’ under the direction of producer Rex Allen Jr. “My concept on this album, when I started listening to these tracks, I didn’t just hear country,” Rex said. “I heard more rockabilly and I heard New Orleans jazz. To me it represents a combination of what Merle Travis was. He was a folk singer, yes; but he also was one of the keynote guys when it came to rockabilly. He could hold his own when it came to New Orleans jazz.”
Signed to Capitol as a singer in the spring of 1946, his first single, “Cincinnati Lou,” b/w “No Vacancy,” became his first hit. Following that he reached #1 with “Divorce Me C.O.D.,” which remained at that position for fourteen weeks in 1947.
Appreciating the sound of solid-body electric steel guitars, Travis designed an electric Spanish solid-body guitar; in 1948 he had it built by Paul Bigsby, a California pattern maker and steel guitar builder. Now in the collection of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, the guitar may have inspired Travis’s friend Leo Fender to design what was to become the legendary Fender Telecaster electric guitar.
In 1955, Tennessee Ernie Ford’s recording of an imaginative coal mining tune Travis had written in 1946, “Sixteen Tons,” became a multi million seller. With Ford, “Sixteen Tons” became an American standard and renewed interest in Travis.
Merle Travis – Sixteen Tons Track List:
1. Cincinnati Lou
2. Cannonball Rag
3. Common Folks Common Folks Don’t
4. Midnight Special
5. I’ll See You In My Dreams
6. Louisiana Boogie
7. Sixteen Tons
8. Lawdy, What A Gal
9. I Am A Pilgrim
10. Merle’s Boogie Woogie
11. Kentucky Means Paradise
12. If You Want It, I’ve Got It
13. Fat Gal
14. John Henry
15. That’s All
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