Johnny Cash - The Legend of Johnny Cash
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Johnny CashEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2005-10-25
Music Label: Hip-O Records
Soundtracks:
- Cry! Cry! Cry!
- Hey Porter
- Folsom Prison Blues
- I Walk The Line
- Get Rhythm
- Big River
- Guess THings Happen That Way
- Ring Of Fire
- Jackson
- A Boy Named Sue
- Sunday Morning Coming Down
- Man In Black
- One Piece At A Time
- Highwayman
- The Wanderer - U2
- Delia's Gone
- Rusty Cage
- I've Been Everywhere
- Give My Love To Rose
- The Man Comes Around (Early Take)
- Hurt
Free Music Notes for The Legend of Johnny Cash
Free Music Review: A fitting tribute (to a legend)
Hit: 5 Stars
What people say about leaders is also true about Johnny Cash fans: They aren't born, they're made.
As a child of the 80s--a time when "Karma Chameleon" was considered the height of musical sophistication--I never knew much about Johnny Cash. I just knew him as The Man in Black, a vaguely famous country singer. Then I saw Walk the Line, bought The Legend of Johnny Cash CD, and was converted. Cash has IT. He has that something that makes the listener stop and connect with the song.
So, as a new fan, it's a difficult if not impossible task to pick the "best" songs on this career-spanning album. All the older hits are there--"Cry Cry Cry," "I Walk the Line," "Get Rhythm," "Ring of Fire"--and haven't lost their original luster. ("I Walk the Line" is my personal favorite from this era because the lyrics cut straight into the soul of anyone who's ever been cynical, lonely, and completely surprised by love.) "Jackson" is a firecracker-hot duet with June Carter, but "It Ain't Me, Babe" is conspicuously absent.
His more contemporary works--"Delia's Gone," for instance--also stand out as testaments to the timelessness of his rolling bass line and world-weary voice. Cash's covers, too, are brilliant. His rendition of Hank Snow's "I've Been Everywhere" is appealing, as is his take on Soundgarden's "Rusty Cage."
But, for me, the number one song on the album is "Hurt," Cash's interpretation of Nine Inch Nails' paen to addiction. His quavering vocals bely the universality of the pain of addiction, and the slowly-building background music makes the reader understand the increasing desperation of dependency. The song wraps you up in its raw emotion and nearly overwhelms you. For a second, you know what it means to be an addict, to give anything--"my empire of dirt"--to change. For a second, Cash sets up shop in your soul.
After hearing "Hurt," I knew why so many people love Cash. While his voice may quiver, it has a dramatic urgency that burns the songs into your brain. That voice is the sound of redemption from a man who's been to the bottom and barely made it back up.
Bottom line: This is an excellent introduction to The Man in Black. It's a small slice of his talent, but it's sure to leave you wanting more.
The Legend of Johnny Cash Poster
The Legend of Johnny Cash spans his entire career for the first time on a single disc. Featuring 21 of his recordings on the Sun, Columbia, Island, and American Recordings labels, it's the first compilation to include his work on American. Also highlighting the package is a 16-page deluxe booklet with photos and essay by author Rich Kienzle.His Sun Records tracks begin with his first single, "Hey, Porter"/"Cry! Cry! Cry!," a Country Top 20 penned by Cash and produced by Sam Phillips. Straddling country and rock 'n' roll, they scored in 1956 with the Top 10 Country "Folsom Prison Blues," #1 Country/Top 20 Pop "I Walk The Line" and #1 Country "Get Rhythm." Also heard from his Sun days are 1958's "Big River" (#4 Country/Top 20 Pop) and "Guess Things Happen That Way" (#1 Country/Top 20 Pop).Cash signed with Columbia in 1958 and five years later had a #1 Country/Top 20 Pop hit with "Ring of Fire," a ballad co-written by June Carter, who in 1967 would duet with him on the #2 Country "Jackson" and later become his wife. In 1969, the live Johnny Cash at San Quentin yielded his biggest hit: Shel Silverstein's novelty "A Boy Named Sue" (#1 Country/#2 Pop).Kris Kristofferson composed Cash's 1970 #1 Country hit "Sunday Morning Coming Down" while Cash himself composed his personal philosophy on 1971's #3 Country "Man in Black," his nickname for the rest of his days. Also from his Columbia tenure are 1976's "One Piece at a Time" (#1 Country/Top 30 Pop) and 1985's "Highwayman" with Waylon Jennings and Kristofferson.Cash joined Mercury in 1986 and The Legend of Johnny Cash includes a track from that period titled "The Wanderer," a duet with U2 written by Bono and U2, taken from the group's 1993 release Zooropa. That same year Rick Rubin, known for producing rap and rock acts, offered to record Cash singing whatever he chose. 1994's American Recordings, including college radio favorite "Delia's Gone," brought Cash to a new generation and won the Best Contemporary Folk Album Grammy. On 1996's Unchained, Cash brilliantly interpreted Soundgarden's "Rusty Cage" as well as the Hank Snow classic "I've Been Everywhere" and copped the Grammy for Best Country Album. On 2003's American IV: The Man Comes Around, he revisited old favorite "Give My Love to Rose" and gave new meaning to Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" (the video for "Hurt" was 6 times nominated at MTV's 2003 VMAs and also won a Grammy for "Best Short Form Music Video" that same year). From 2003's posthumous box set Unearthed, The Legend of Johnny Cash adds an early take on "The Man Comes Around."This introduction to the Man in Black's catalog is about as fine a one as can be found on one disc, primarily because the 21 classic tracks span J.R. Cash's entire career, from his first rockabilly single, "Hey, Porter"/"Cry! Cry! Cry!" (Sun Records, 1955), to his last significant alt-country tracks (American Recordings, 2003). Though Cash had his peaks and valleys in the studio, what shines brightly on this collection is how constant--how unwavering--his creativity remained, whether he was writing and performing original material or interpreting the work of others. His voice, too, remained a majestic thing of wonder, even as Cash often sang off-beat; settled his bass-baritone somewhere around, if not on the note; and cared more about power and emotion than strict rules of measure--something that became especially important as illness changed his great oaken voice into a frail instrument. In this way, he was able to infuse novelty songs ("One Piece at a Time," "A Boy Named Sue") with undeniable cool and maintain the poetry of Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down" even in the awful advent of a gloppy, too-peppy string section. Other chestnuts here take on new dimension in retrospect. "Jackson," a duet with wife June Carter Cash, seemed almost comedic ("hotter than a pepper sprout") when it was released, but now reveals the couple's own white-hot sexuality, primarily in June's elegant, if straightahead vocal. The surprise of The Legend of Johnny Cash is how seamlessly the newer material blends with the seminal, and how full-circle it sometimes comes: Soundgarden's "Rusty Cage" doesn't seem markedly different from the quietly defiant songs that Cash defined himself with in the '50s and early '60s. Yet the compilation producers, like Cash himself, saved the best for last. "Hurt," Trent Reznor's poignant meditation on addiction, is devastating as written, but becomes a thing of terrible beauty in the ailing Cash's ravaged, autobiographical delivery. Sequenced as the final cut on the album, it ends with a kind of shocking void; stunning in its intensity, dropping the listener off a cliff of something very akin to grief. No artist, no matter what genre, could have planned a more haunting exit. --Alanna Nash
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