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The most complete and comprehensive collection of Presley's final studio recordings ever assembled in one anthology, Way Down In The Jungle Room is an essential and welcome addition for every fan's library. In the mid - 1970s, Elvis, the King of Rock 'n' Roll, became another kind of pioneer as one of the world's first major recording artists to create fully-realized professional level records in the intimacy of his own home studio which was located in Graceland's Jungle Room.
Way Down In The Jungle Room brings together, for the first time in one collection, master recordings and rare outtakes laid down during two mythic sessions (February 2 - 8, 1976 and October 28 - 30, 1976) in Graceland's den--known as the "Jungle Room" - which was converted into a professional caliber recording studio for the purpose of capturing these indelible performances. The outtakes have been newly mixed by Grammy Award-winning engineer Matt Ross-Spang at Sam Phillips Recording in Memphis, Tennessee.
For these sessions, Elvis was backed by many members of his longtime touring band including: James Burton (guitar), Ronnie Tutt (drums), David Briggs (keyboards), Glenn D. Hardin (keyboards), Jerry Scheff (bass), Norbert Putnam (bass) and J.D. Sumner & the Stamps (vocals).
In 1976, when the tracks for Way Down In The Jungle Room were cut, Elvis Presley had been an RCA Records recording artist for 20 years, inventing the sound and attitude that defined the very essence of Rock 'n' Roll. That same year, RCA released The Sun Sessions, the label's first official collection of the electrifying 1954 - 1955 Elvis recordings that launched his career while transforming the world.
Having entered his 40s, Elvis Presley was evolving as an artist and, rather than bask in the nostalgia of his 1950s watershed recordings, he looked for new ways to express himself musically. Needing to create new sounds for a new era, Elvis Presley, who had been charting on Country and Adult Contemporary stations, decided to convert the Hawaiian-themed "Jungle Room" into an informal home studio where he could lay down tracks the way he wanted without the scheduling pressures of the professional studios he'd worked in previously. With the help of RCA's mobile recording truck and longtime producer Felton Jarvis and engineer Mike Moran, Elvis tackled a far-ranging mix of country and pop covers ("Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain," "I'll Never Fall in Love Again," "Danny Boy," "Solitaire") and late-period classics of his catalog, such as "Moody Blue" and "Way Down."
Ten of the "Jungle Room" masters were first included on "From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee" in the spring of 1976, including the Top 10 hit "Hurt." More tracks from these sessions were later paired with live material and released in July 1977 on Elvis' last album' "Moody Blue." The title track would top the country charts that month; "Way Down" would follow. These were the last studio albums released during Elvis' lifetime.
According to the album's producers, Way Down In The Jungle Room has been resequenced to "bring a fresh perspective to the material." The material on Disc 2 - The Outtakes was mixed for this collection at the Sam Phillips Recording Service in Memphis and includes both outtakes and in-the-studio dialog, providing a "fly-on-the-wall" experience of what the sessions were like. With the exception of track 13 ("She Thinks I Still Care"), the performances on Disc 2 have been sequenced in the order they were recorded.
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