Biography

Available March 11, 2014

Long out-of-print Memphis classic with 6 bonus tracks!
LP first pressing on translucent blue vinyl with download card of entire album and bonus tracks!

Sid Selvidge’s The Cold Of The Morning is a mid-’70s Memphis classic. And, it almost never saw the light of day.

Recorded in 1975, Selvidge and producer Jim Dickinson (Big Star, Ry Cooder, The Replacements) created a 12-track song cycle, captured live in the studio with Selvidge on vocals and guitar, plus Dickinson on piano with Memphis’ iconic Mudboy and the Neutrons on two tracks. With a cover photo taken by William Eggleston, it was destined for greatness, but when Peabody Records’ benefactor decided not to put the record out at the last minute, he gave the rights to the recently pressed LP to Selvidge, who drove down to the plant, loaded up his car and distributed them himself. The album eventually found its way into regional stores and the national press, even reaching the Cashbox charts, and was enough to take Selvidge to New York, but life intervened, and bigger record deals were not in the cards.

Omnivore Recordings is proud to issue this indelible piece of the Memphis music canon on CD for the first time in over two decades and on LP for the first time since its initial release. Produced in conjunction with Sid’s son, Steve (The Hold Steady), it has been expanded to include six previously unissued tracks from the original sessions. (The CD contains the full 18 track playlist, the LP has the original 12 tracks with a download card for the full 18 songs.) Consisting of originals, blues standards, and Broadway classics, The Cold Of The Morning, is not only a snapshot of a time and place, but of Selvidge himself. The package includes rare photographs and an in-depth essay from Bob Mehr of The Commercial Appeal.

Selvidge would eventually turn Peabody into a boutique label, issuing records by Cybil Shepherd, and even Alex Chilton’s solo debut, Like Files On Sherbert. He continued to record, releasing a 1993 album on Elektra and a triumphant swansong, I Should Be Blue, in 2010. But, it all began on The Cold Of The Morning. “He said, ‘Look, I’ve made my classic record,” recalls his son, Steve. “It was almost like he was apart from it. It really was the perfect capturing of the perfect moment, and it made for his most perfect statement.”