Sons of Merle Haggard Hint Possible Release of Archived Material: “There’s Stuff That Has Never Been Heard”

A couple of months back, the son of Waylon Jennings, Shooter Jennings, announced the impending release of three albums, all containing archived Waylon Jennings music. The first of those three is titled Songbird and will be released on October 3, 2025. Seemingly entertaining a similar idea are the sons of Merle Haggard, Ben and Noel Haggard, as they recently divulged that their late father has some rare and unreleased archived material in his catalog.

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Ben and Noel Haggard recently appeared on the Drifting Cowboy Podcast and revealed that they are “messing around with” their father’s archived material in the studio. According to their comments, the archived materials don’t just include music, but also live shows and homemade movies.

That being so, it seems Ben, Noel, and the rest of the Merle Haggard family have more than enough footage and songs to work with, and just possibly, release. Here is what the brothers said about their father’s deep cut content.

Ben Haggard Says His Father’s Unheard Songs “Need To Find a Way Out”

Concerning the unreleased Merle Haggard music, Ben Haggard stated on the pod, “Oh yeah. Yeah. There’s some stuff we’ve been messing around with in the studio.” “There’s stuff of his, you know, a good amount of archive. Live shows and stuff… my mother will probably end up doing something with. Getting some stuff out there.”

“There’s stuff that has never been heard, new songs and stuff out there, for certain. Which need to find a way out, if you ask me,” continued Ben Haggard. Regarding the archival footage, Noel added, “There’s some homemade movies that he used to do in Bakersfield.” “I was just a little kid running wires and stuff for them, you know. But it was hilarious. He’d do commercials and everything. Those have got to be somewhere, you know.”

Other than merely toying around with and viewing the content, it seems Noel, Ben, and their mother have not made any robust plans. However, they are seemingly eager to share their father’s memory through this unreleased material. So, hopefully, there will be some deep cut Merle Haggard content released to the country music public in the near future.

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