Johnny Cash - American VI: Ain't No Grave

Johnny Cash died on September 12, 2003, and although producer Rick Rubin stated this album was coming when American V: A Hundred Highways was released in 2006, it's understandable for there to be trepidation among fans. No matter the genre, many music legends after their deaths, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley, Elvis Presley, and Frank Sinatra to name a few, have had their discographies bloated by record labels emptying the vaults, releasing alternate takes, unreleased tracks, and live performances an artist may not have wanted the public to hear. That's in addition to all the repurpsoed material used in numerous greatest hits and best-of collections that flood the market. Not every posthumous release has been a bust because quite a few gems have been unearthed but fans have been burned many times over by this practice.

In this instance, everyone can unburden themselves of that concern because Johnny's legacy is in the capable and trusted hands of producer Rick Rubin and associate producer/son John Carter Cash and is culled from the same sessions that created American V, which found Johnny backed by talented musicians Mike Campbell and Benmont Tench of the Heartbreakers, and guitarists Smokey Hormel, Matt Sweeney, and Johnny Polansky.

The album opens with the title track serving as a counterpoint to the fatalistic "God's Gonna Cut You Down." A foot stomps (Seth Avett), referencing the previous song, and chains clatter during this spiritual as Johnny sings of his eventual ascension, "ain't no grave/ Can hold my body down," and meeting with loved ones that went on ahead. The arrangement includes Scott Avett on banjo and Tench creating some wonderful flourishes.

Although Sheryl Crow's "Redemption Day" was released in 1996, when Johnny sings it in 2003, it seems directed at the war in Iraq as he shows empathy for the troops and disgust at the leaders he mockingly calls "men of great" as he asks them "Was there no oil to excavate/ No riches in trade for the fate/ Of every person who died in hate." Johnny's anti-war stance is brought back into focus on Ed McCurdy's "Last Night I Had The Strangest Dream" about a man who dreamt "the world had all agreed/ To put an end to war." The subject obviously weighed heavy on a man of his age who had seen that path taken too many times.

Kris Kristofferson's "For The Good Times" is a song about the break-up of a relationship ("I know it's over/ But life goes on"), yet when Johnny sings about "the good times," it becomes a love song to his recently departed June Carter.

Johnny's gospel hymn "I Corinthians 15:55" is likely to draw a tear to all those who bonded with the man as he sings of what was his then-impending end. It begins with the first two lines from the Bible passage: "Oh death, where is thy sting? / Oh grave, where is thy victory?" but all is calm as he sounds comforted knowing "hope springs eternal just over the rise/ When I see my redeemer beckoning me."

Folk singer Tom Paxton's "Can't Help But Wonder Where I'm Bound" presents an alternate position as Johnny sounds like he no longer has that security of his certainty. This unknowing causes him a "troubled mind" and is a fitting song for the current upheaval many in the United States feel.

Quick to provide comfort, Johnny sings J.H. Red Hayes & Jack Rhodes' "Satisfied Mind" over an acoustic guitar. He wants to dispel the notion that wealth is the answer to problems because "Money can't buy back/ Your youth when you're old/ Or a friend when you're lonely/ Or a love that's grown cold."

As the album closes and Johnny says goodbye for the last time, he references his previous farewell "We'll Meet Again" from American IV with Queen Liliuokalani's "Aloha Oe" which contains the same line and sentiment. He alternates between English and Hawaiian, evoking the image of sailing off into the sunset.

Ain't No Grave is a satisfying swansong to Johnny's career. Dealing with failing health and the loss of his beloved June in his final days, the listener can hear Johnny made peace with his mortality and attained a level of awareness about life that inspired him to create great art, which should in turn inspire those who come into contact with it.

Stories Done: Writings on the 1960s and Its Discontents by Mikal Gilmore

Stories Done is a collection of music journalist Mikal Gilmore’s work from Rolling Stone about people and events that had a great cultural impact during the 1960s and into the 1970s. While all decades are filled with moments of notoriety, infamy, and significance — illuminated by the passage of time and the work of historians — the 1960s (especially in the United States) stands out as a decade of great change and upheaval. It was an era of seemingly limitless human potential bound by imagination and consciousness, both expanded by external sources.

Gilmore states in his introduction the subjects of his articles, which include eulogies for recently departed icons and commemorations of anniversaries, “were part of a major historical shift that not only challenged the cultural and social values of that age, but also, for an astonishing term, almost preempted the real power of the era.”

The accomplishments of the Beats were a great influence on the 1960s so it’s fitting the book opens with a feature on Allan Ginsberg, who had the most direct involvement with those who followed in their footsteps off the beaten path. What Ginsberg did with his art to affect the status quo, Timothy Leary did with science in his promotion of LSD, a drug taken by many of the people included herein.

Some articles make the case for artists who had an impact on the decade though they don’t come to mind immediately when referring to the ‘60s. Johnny Cash usually evokes the 1950s, but he certainly made his stamp on the decade with “Ring of Fire” coming out in ‘63, At Folsom Prison in ’68, At San Quentin in '69, his recording with Dylan, and his own television variety show. Comparatively, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin dominated the 1970s, but each got their start in the ‘60s. Led by Syd Barrett, the psychedelically inclined Floyd released their first album in 1967. Zepp, dubbed “the last band of the 1960s and the first of the 1970s” by RS’s Steve Pond, got their start in 1969 with the release of two albums that altered the rock landscape.

Gilmore reveals himself throughout to be a brilliant, enlightening, and engaging writer. Even in stories I have memorized from countless times of exposure, from those on Jim Morrison and The Doors to his fellow RS writer Hunter S. Thompson, Gilmore’s prose captivates because of the high quality of his writing. He also reveals himself at opportune moments, sharing his experiences of an LSD trip he took one night shortly before Leary’s death as well as an intimate phone call thanking Cash for calling his notorious brother, Gary Gilmore, the night before his execution.

The book is not always best when read in the order presented or in a short time frame. Understandably, the chapters are comprised of articles sharing a theme, but in some instances there’s too much repetition because of the crisscrossing of people and places and the focus Gilmore gives key events. The lives of Beatles George Harrison and John Lennon, and even their creation Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, obviously couldn’t be told without crossover. However, there is a little too much redundancy in the stories about author Ken Kesey, Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia who played at Kesey’s Acid Tests, and the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood where Garcia lived as well as other residents who took part in the Acid Tests. To be fair, the latter articles were printed over the course of 12 years so the overlap is warranted since they were intended as individual pieces.

Another critique is something Gilmore mentions in the book’s introduction as “obvious shortcomings.” While acknowledging there are no women or R&B and jazz musicians featured, it’s still a surprise the only person of color featured is Bob Marley, whose impact occurred in the ‘70s. Although an argument could be made about his cultural influence outside of music, Jimi Hendrix’s omission from a book that mainly focuses on musicians from the ‘60s is rather stunning regardless of his skin color.

Those minor points aside, Stories Done serves equally as a great introduction to the era and the individuals and as wonderful remembrances to counterculture heroes. The stories provide great insight and occasional revelations to a bygone time, offering inspiration and lessons learned, though too late for some. Mikal Gilmore proves to be an inspiration also and is well worth reading no matter the subject.

Johnny Cash: At Folsom Prison - Legacy Edition

As legend has it, while stationed in West Germany as he served in the United States Air Force, Johnny Cash saw the movie Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison and was inspired to the write his classic 1955 hit “Folsom Prison Blues.” What’s not as well known about the story is that Cash liberally took from Gordon Jenkins’ “Crescent City Blues” and settled a lawsuit because of it. But that didn’t stop “Folsom Prison Blues” from becoming a quintessential Johnny Cash song due in part to its combination of a prisoner and a train, frequent themes throughout his work.

As he sang in “Man in Black,” Cash had empathy for all those in society “who are held back” and that included inmates, which is why he performed in jails and advocated prison reforms. The first time it was captured live for people outside the walls was 1968’s At Folsom Prison, a landmark album that helped revitalize Cash’s career, which had gone into a slump because of his drug addiction and shifting priorities at Columbia Records. In 1973, he told Rolling Stone, “that's where things really got started for me again.”

In 1999, At Folsom Prison was re-released with three extra tracks and once again in 2008 labeled a “Legacy Edition” with both shows recorded from that day, the 65-minute first show with seven previously unissued tracks and the 75-minute second show with 24 previously unissued tracks. The shows are also uncensored, so you hear Cash sing about how he “shot that bad bitch down” in “Cocaine Blues,” which gets raucous approval from the inmates, and during the second show at the beginning of “25 Minutes To Go” he playfully warns the audience, “don’t say ‘shit’ or anything like that out loud.” The “Legacy Edition” also includes a feature-length documentary that examines the album’s creation and its legacy. Cash can be heard in interviews throughout and many others including Cash’s bassist Marshall Grant, Marty Stuart, Merle Haggard, and former inmates reflect upon it.

The beginning of the disc one is new material as Los Angles radio DJ Hugh Cherry handles announcements. Then the supporting acts perform: Carl Perkins with his classic “Blue Suede Shoes” followed by The Statler Brothers “The Ole House.”

Backed by arguably the best backing trio ever in country music, the Tennessee Three, Cash opens, as the original album did, with “Folsom Prison Blues.” He then wisely chooses many other songs his audience will identify with from the two previously mentioned to “Joe Bean” who is going to be hanged for a crime he didn’t commit. Cash closes the set with Glen Sherley’s “Greystone Chapel.” Sherley was a Folsom inmate at the time and wrote about the prison’s church.

Yet, the set is not all prison songs. Although Merle Travis’ “Dark As A Dungeon” is about a coal mine, the audience can identify with the lyrics “Where danger is double and pleasures are few/ Where the rain never falls and the sun never shines.” Also, two funny love songs by Cowboy Jack Clement, “Dirty Old Egg Sucking Dog” and “Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart,” have a serious subtext about affairs of the heart.

About half the unissued material is Cash alone with his guitar singing somber songs. “The Long Black Veil” is what a man’s wife wears because he went to jail and was hung rather than give his alibi “I’d been in the arms/ of my best friend’s wife.” In “Send A Picture of Mother” a man requests upon his brother’s release not to mention that his escape attempt will forever keep him in jail. “The Wall” is about a man who commits suicide trying to escape jail. While there was no doubt many a tough and hardened man in the audience, it’s hard to believe all eyes were dry after these songs.

To the delight of the men, June Carter came out for their hit duet “Jackson” and the previously unreleased cover of Ray Charles’ “I Got A Woman.” After the seven-minute “Legend of John Henry’s Hammer,” June offers a silly poem about a cow, which can be heard for the first time.

The second show started three hours after the first started and you can hear the difference. Cash and the Tennessee Three aren’t as energetic as the first show, and on “Orange Blossom Special” Cash messes up the lyrics and sounds out of breath. Still, any Johnny Cash concert is miles ahead of many other artists and the second show is well worth a listen. “Give My Love to Rose” and “I Got Stripes” are the only songs from the second show that made the original-album cut. The only other song not played earlier was “Long-Legged Guitar Pickin’ Man” which they really rock on, especially June’s raspy growl. It's amazing they never thought to release it until now.

Carl Perkins and The Statler Brothers played more songs than the previous show. The highlight is the Statlers’ “You Can’t Have Your Kate and Edith, Too,” a very funny song with the narrator telling a friend he has to choose one woman, and it better not be the narrator’s.

At Folsom Prison: Legacy Edition improves on the original release, which is a hard feat to accomplish for an album of such historical significance. It is a must-have for any music fan that doesn’t own it, and a valuable upgrade if you do.