HOLLYWOOD — Musician and producer Shooter Jennings is producing previously unreleased recordings by his father, country music legend Waylon Jennings, at Sunset Sound in Hollywood. He has produced two albums from this material, titled "Songbird" and "Diamonds." The album "Diamonds" is scheduled for release later this year.

Shooter Jennings discovered the unreleased Waylon Jennings material stored away. He has recorded approximately 40 records at Sunset Sound, a studio where artists such as Dolly Parton, Fleetwood Mac, and Prince have also recorded. Shooter Jennings has also produced Grammy Award-winning albums for Brandi Carlisle and Tanya Tucker.

Waylon Jennings garnered 16 number one hits during his career, including "I'm a Rambling Man" and "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys." He also performed the theme song for the television series "The Dukes of Hazzard." Waylon Jennings passed away in 2002 at the age of 64.

As a teenager, Waylon Jennings worked as a DJ between Lubbock, Texas, and New Mexico, where he met Buddy Holly. Holly encouraged Jennings to pursue a music career, and they toured together. In 1959, Jennings and Holly were scheduled to perform a show in Iowa. Shooter Jennings recounted a conversation his father had with Buddy Holly involving strong language, where his father joked about Holly's plane crashing. "The last conversation that was had was like, 'I hope your bus breaks down and you freeze to death,'" Shooter Jennings said. "And then he says, 'I hope your whole plane crashes,' you know?"

Waylon Jennings later relocated to Nashville. Shooter Jennings shared that the term "outlaw movement" was a marketing tool developed in Nashville to package artists like Waylon and Willie Nelson. "It was a marketing tool. They came up with it in Nashville. It was a way to package Waylon and Willie, and then kind of called it the outlaw movement," Shooter Jennings said. He stated that his father gained creative freedom and artistic control through this movement. "He got his creative freedom and artistic integrity and control, which is what he wanted. and that kind of freed everybody else in Nashville – independence for artists," Shooter Jennings said.

Waylon Jennings left the "We Are the World" recording session, stating that he believed the session was not genuinely focused on the children the song aimed to help. "He goes, 'This isn't about the kids,'" Shooter Jennings said. Shooter Jennings also mentioned that Paul Simon informed him that others at the session wanted to leave, but his father was the only one who did. Waylon Jennings struggled with a drug habit, sometimes spending over $1,000 per day on drugs, but he quit cold turkey in 1984.

Shooter Jennings mentioned that his father's struggle with drugs bothered him greatly. "It bothered him so much," Shooter Jennings said. He noted that he was young when his father stopped using drugs. "It didn't affect me one bit. When I was a kid, he quit by the time I was, like, five or six. And I think once he won the battle, was when he realized he didn't need it anymore. He was a great dad," Shooter Jennings said. "I'm proud of him and I'm proud of the work that I'm doing, and I'm proud of the legacy he left behind, because you know, he just was a good guy," Shooter Jennings said. He added, "I want everybody to know the guy I know."

No independent assessment of Shooter Jennings’s claims was available.