Scotty McCreery has a new record label home: After parting ways with Universal Music Group's Mercury Nashville in early 2016, the singer has signed with Triple Tigers Records.

Triple Tigers formed as a partnership between Thirty Tigers, Triple 8 Management and Sony Music in late 2016. The Triple Tigers label focuses on commercial country music; Russell Dickerson was the label's first signing.

"We are very proud to represent Scotty McCreery. He is an absolute pro and an artist of great integrity," says Triple Tigers Records General Manager Norbert Nix. Adds McCreery, "I’m very excited to become part of the Triple Tigers / Sony Music Entertainment family. They believe in me and my music, they work hard, and for being a brand-new company, they are already succeeding. I am fired up to see what we can achieve together.”

McCreery signed with Mercury Nashville after winning Season 10 of American Idol in 2011. After leaving the label, he spent much of 2016 dealing with legal issues and red tape.

"You always hear about the Idol contracts and stuff … We’re still dealing with it all, so we haven’t gotten totally released yet, but … we’ve got a few people in the back rooms who are kind of waiting on it all," McCreery explained in late 2016. "So once it all breaks, we’ll be rocking and rolling — just waiting on one of those Idol signatures.”

In May, McCreery independently released a single, "Five More Minutes," written with Frank Rogers and Monty Criswell shortly after the death of his grandfather in January of 2015. The song currently sits at No. 40 on the Billboard Country Airplay chart, and at No. 46 on the Country Aircheck / Mediabase chart -- that makes it the first song released by an artist without a record label to chart in the latter chart's Top 50.

""Five More Minutes" is such a personal song for me, and it feels like it’s become very personal for the radio listeners and concert audiences as well. To learn that it made chart history is mind-blowing," McCreery says. "I’m proud of all the hard work that my team and I have done on our own, and I cannot wait to see what we are able to achieve working with my new family at Triple Tigers Records.”

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