"The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" by Earl Thomas Conley

According to both Wikipedia and the YouTube video I found of this version, country musician Earl Thomas Conley released a cover of The Band's "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" as a single back in 1971, but I can't find any information on the single. I have managed to find it on a couple of compilation albums, but that's it. I'm going to avoid submitting it for now until I can track down original release details. I've tried 45cats/45worlds, Discogs, Musicbrainz and All Music Guide. Discogs lists it on a compilation album from the 80s, but it's not listed on any of the other sites.

Hi Oldiesmann, for country music the bible is praguefrank, in this case http://countrydiscoghraphy2.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Conley%20Earl%20Thomas and for label scans ebay will often help out, item 122828579130 (ebay links are time-limited though).

Well, praguefrank has the recording taking place in Nashville, while the record label says Huntsville, Alabama so nothing's perfect...

Cheers!

Thanks for the link!

Others may disagree, but if you have confirmed that X artist has covered Y song, I would go ahead and submit with a "don't know" original release but notes of what you have determined (e.g. a later release). This allows others to more easily find it and add what they may find out. Moreover, many users probably don't care about the original release.

Now added The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down , thanks!