New Randy Travis is on the way.
Today, the country legend announced his first album of original music in over 18 years, and the first single from the album, “Fish On,” is set to drop this Friday, July 10th. This year marks 40 years since Randy’s debut album Storms Of Life, so there’s no more fitting time to put out some new music than now.
Randy and his wife, Mary, say that these songs are from “the vault,” which means that they are likely all old songs that were never released for whatever reason, as opposed to being AI-assisted songs, which Travis has dabbled with before:
“Sharing the love of music for decades with listeners of all ages has been an honor of mine. I feel extremely blessed. Earlier this week, as we announced my new album and played some of the songs for the children and families at St. Jude Children’s Hospital in Memphis, I was reminded of my reason for doing it.
Gratitude and appreciation welled up as emotions I didn’t expect when stories were shared about a particular song’s impact on their lives. I hope these dusted-off songs from the vault touch folks the same old way.”
It’s something he’s been teasing on social media, and Travis previously did a tour of St. Jude Children’s Hospital earlier this week, where they previewed the recordings for the first time, so
Kyle Lehning, Randy’s longtime producer, is the one who assembled, remixed, and remastered a number of great songs from throughout their career together. It’s seemingly a similar project to the one Shooter Jennings is working on, which consists of three separate albums of songs he discovered from his father’s vault which were never officially recorded to be released.
Often, these types of “vault” records happen after an artist passes away, though in Travis’ unique case, he was able to be part of the process and seemingly helped make decisions on which songs to release, how they were produced, and all kinds of things of that nature.
Due to Randy’s 2013 stroke, he suffers from severe language impairments, and is no longer able to sing, so something like this is very special and unexpected, and during a conversation with Whiskey Riff earlier this year, Mary revealed that they have an entire album’s worth of archived music which was recorded before Randy’s stroke in 2013:
“We got a full deck. We have a whole new album coming out of archived music. It’s stuff that he had sang before the stroke. It’s been mastered, mixed and ready to go. We’ll be having a new album.”
They haven’t released the tracklist or even album title or release date yet, though considering they’re putting out the first single on Friday, I have to imagine all of those details are coming soon.
And album full of real deal, Randy Travis originals… it feels like Christmas.
Randy Travis Tour Dates
Aug. 21 – Hiawassee, GA – Georgia Mountain Fall Festival – Anderson Music Hall
Aug. 22 – Richmond, KY – The Vine at Chenault Vineyards
Sept. 23 – Wilkes-Barre, PA – F.M. Kirby Center for the Performing Arts
Sept. 24 – Lansdowne, PA – Lansdowne Theater
Sept. 25 – Westbury, NY – Flagstar at Westbury Music Fair
Sept. 26 – York, PA – Pullo Center
Sept. 27 – Albany, NY – The Egg Performing Arts Center
Oct. 1 – New London, CT – Garde Arts Center
Oct. 2 – Keene, NH – Colonial Theatre
Oct. 3 – Plymouth, MA – Plymouth Memorial Hall
Oct. 4 – Northampton, MA – Academy of Music Theatre
Oct. 14 – Austin, TX – The Long Center for the Performing Arts
Oct. 15 – Dallas, TX – Longhorn Ballroom
Oct. 22 – Lubbock, TX – Buddy Holly Hall
Oct. 23 – Albuquerque, NM – Popejoy Theatre
Oct. 24 – Pueblo, CO – Pueblo Memorial Hall
Nov. 6 – Oklahoma City, OK – Civic Center Music Hall
Nov. 7 – Topeka, KS – Topeka Performing Arts Center
Nov. 8 – Branson, MO – Clay Cooper Theatre
