Album Review: Johnny Cash – At Folsom Prison Legacy Edition

Now I see it was Juli Thanki that wrote this. I really liked her piece on PopMatters that you reference.

Aw, my first fan who’s not my mom! Thanks for reading Baron; “Twang Nation” is one of my first stops in the morning.

They’re building a gallows outside my cell…

“I may be the only country fan who doesn’t really care about Johnny Cash, and who doesn’t like “At Folsom Prison” much.”

While I disagree with Mike, I think I finally understand how y’all must feel when people say that they’re not fans of Dale Watson!

Ge,, Rainbow, do you prefer some Taylor Swift instead of the Man in Black?

For the real Cash fan, this collection is the Holy Grail, but I suspect the more casual fan would prefer listening to one of the shorter versions of the concert. For that fan I would recommend the 1999 release.

I don’t regard either the 1968 or 1999 versions as being “sterilized” and would never knock either version. THey both represent “Best of” versions of Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison. Remember too, that there were limitations on how much music you could put on a vinyl LP without running into loss of volume and sound compression. For 1968, Columbia’s sound engineers made exactly the right decision, given that two record sets were very rare in those days

My 1968 album (purchased new in 1968) got played so much that it shows signs of wear (but because I always handled it properly, it is not “worn out”). I still play it occasionally in order to get that superior “analog” listening experience.

Why are y’all picking on Rainbow for not liking JC when you should be picking on her(him?) for the name “Rainbow.” ;)

Paul W. Dennis is my hero!

It’s him, thank you very much. ;P
And I don’t like CU, Alabama or Garth. I like lots of traditional country. I think the reason why I don’t like Johnny much is that I in general don’t like male artists. Artistically, I’m sure that Johnny is very good. His music just doesn’t hit me like country music should hit you.

With a bottle.

See, Chris? John Rich IS a genius.

Fair enough. Who is an artist you do like? You’ve ruled out male artists, Taylor Swift, and Carrie Underwood.

But I do like some male artists – Josh Gracin, Jimmy Wayne and Vince Gill for example.

The Garth “is he or isn’t he” legit argument is an old one, and Jim and I fall on different sides of it, but my favorite thing I’ve read on the subject is on Robbie Fulks’ website

it’s from a set of articles titles “My Worst Gig Ever” and here is an excerpt

“After giving a hard listen to twenty-four of his best-loved songs, my opinion was partly confirmed. A song called “That Summer” was an egregious case. A life-lesson power ballad about an innocent yet carnal relationship between a young farmboy and an older widow, it made me feel like the outraged pastor in “Harold and Maude” who tries to cool Bud Cort’s lust by describing Ruth Gordon’s thighs, buttocks, etc. in grandiloquent flights of poetic putrescence. “The Thunder Rolls,” another stomach-turner, was a musical version of an ABC Movie of The Week, where we learn that it just might be OK to kill your husband, if he is inconsiderate enough. Also that a woman’s emotions are very powerful things indeed, like thunder. C-c-c-rack!”

the whole article can be found here
http://robbiefulks.com/articles/index.html?id=00063

Fulks has several songs where the cheatee kills the cheater- so I have to take all of this with a grain of salt. It is a great article though.

I think what makes Garth so great for me, is that he never phones it in. He puts everything he can into every song. They aren’t all great songs, but he managed to turn mediocre songs into good ones, and good songs into great ones. Dig up Mark Chesnutt’s version of Friends in Low Places. It’s utterly forgettable. Garth turned it into a great song (an overplayed, now sometimes annoying great song, but great nonetheless).

I have odd taste when it comes to male artists.

I’ve said this (in some form) before, but I’ll reiterate it. For me, the American Recordings, while excellent, don’t change my assessment of Cash’s career and legacy. However, I think there are a lot of Cash “fans” out there to whom American Recordings is the sine qua non. They’d hardly know who Cash is if he hadn’t cut “Hurt.” They’ve heard only a little bit of Cash’s pre-Rick Rubin material and maybe they kind of like “Walk the Line” and “Folsom Prison Blues” but mostly they just like the fact that Cash was a badass. Those people aren’t country music fans but they’re who Cash is being marketed to these days, and I resent that.

Also, I agree with what Jim said. If you don’t like Garth, or don’t consider him a true country artist, I don’t consider you a country music fan. You may like a lot of country music, but you’re approaching it from a Roots perspective that writes off a lot of viable country artists simply because their music was too “polished.”

“Also, I agree with what Jim said. If you don’t like Garth, or don’t consider him a true country artist, I don’t consider you a country music fan. You may like a lot of country music, but you’re approaching it from a Roots perspective that writes off a lot of viable country artists simply because their music was too “polished.”

I don’t think there’s much need or use in saying that anyone who doesn’t like Garth Brooks isn’t “country music fan”.

And also, I don’t think it’s safe to assume that the only reason to dislike Garth is because his music is too “polished”. I dislike I lot of Garth stuff because it’s too ridiculous and prone to dramatic flourish (”Standing Outside the Fire”, “The Thunder Rolls”, “The Red Strokes”, “The River”, etc).

It seems to me that if someone likes The Carter Family and Hank Williams and Lefty Frizell and Patsy Cline and Buck Owens and George Jones and Loretta Lynn and Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings and Hank Jr. and Dwight Yoakam but doesn’t like Garth Brooks, that it’s pretty arbitrary and silly to exclude them from being a country music fan.

Matt C –

You dont think that the 4 albums that make up The American Recordings, had a tremendous impact on Cash’s legacy? I agree that he would’ve been considered a giant and a true legend without them, but how can you deny the fact that those records brought in loads of new fans (the fact that many of them were young is significant, as there are many who used those releases as a gateway to his earlier work) and those recordings also displayed artistry that was still top notch at such an adnvanced age?

I dont know how fair it is to assume that people who were first familiar with “hurt” before his other work arent true fans, as everyone needs an intro to an artist, regardless of who it is. Those works made Cash relevent to all ages when most greats from yesteryear are sadly relegated to the bargain bin and never truly get introduced to a younger audience when they are in their twilight. To me, those aspects would suggest that his legacy was drastically altered in a positive manner by those releases.

Kelly: I said the American Recordings don’t change my assessment of Cash’s career and legacy. As opposed to a lot of other people, especially country outsiders, who I suspect would not hold nearly so high an opinion of Cash had he never made those recordings.

Others: I don’t mean “like” in the fashion that you are taking it. I think that we all have at least one country legend whose music we respect but don’t really “get,” or just doesn’t bring us much pleasure. However, if you think that Garth’s music is a perversion of the country form, as Baron and Robbie Fulks implied, then you’re not a country music fan, and I stand by that.

Not liking Hank Jr. is perfectly okay with me. I think he recorded some really great material, but it’s been completely buried by the garbage he’s released since. Also, he’s acted like a punk two of the three times I saw his show. Really- what was the last halfway decent thing he recorded?

Johnny Cash has quantity as well, but his career is littered with great songs and moments of genius. I don’t get how one can’t find something to like in his catalog. His work embodies the trains, trucks, prison, mama, and getting drunk criteria- but there are also love songs, funny songs, gospel songs, ditties, epics, and just about anything any music fan could want. My 90 year old Grandfather and 4 year old daughter know his songs by heart.

I guess I can understand that the overall boom-chicka sound with the deep voice might turn someone off- but there are some absolutely stunning songs in his repertoire.

I have mixed feelings about Garth. I thought his first album was a masterpiece. I also liked the second one, but not as much as the first. And after that, he sort of lost me. I don’t consider much of what he did after that point to be authentic country, though admittedly there may be album tracks from his later work that I’m not aware of. I think he was more of a sales whore than an artist. He had a tremendous impact on the genre, but by and large he did more damage than good. JMO.

“Wow- by those standards there really hasn’t been an authentic mainstream country album released by anyone in at least 10-12 years.”

Sure there has. I’ll name just a few: Sara Evans’ “Three Chords And The Truth”, Randy Travis’ “Around The Bend”, and Lee Ann Womack’s “There’s More Where That Came From”. How do you come to the conclusion that if Garth’s later music isn’t authentically country then nobody’s is??

I love all those acts, but besides Womack, none of them really had a ton of charting power. Evans did okay, but “Around the Bend” got zero airplay- as did everything by Yoakam.

The category is successful country released after 1993 that is more authentic than any of Garth’s albums following Ropin’ The Wind. More authentic than remakes of Walking After Midnight and Cowboy’s Lament on “The Chase.” More Authentic than American Honkeytonk Bar Association and The Cowboy Song on “In Pieces” More than That Ole Wind and Beaches of Cheyenne on “Fresh Horses”. Just look at what’s on his albums. The themes are country. The arrangements are country. The stuff is authentic.

But I’m sure I can agree to disagree.

Agreed. Those folks qualify. I would argue that Nothin’ But the Taillights was as rock-fueled as anything Garth put out. I wish country had skewed a little more to the Buddy Miller/Steve Earle side in the mid 90’s- but it didn’t. I would argue that it was acts like Little Texas and John Michael Montgomery with their impossibly sappy chart topping love songs that did the damage (at least for me). Those are the acts that skewed the demographic, that changed radio programming into adult contemporary flavored garbage. It churned out acts like Bryan White. It brought us the pop stylings of Colin Raye and later Mark Wills. Alabama went from crappy working man anthems “I’m in a Hurry” to crappy love songs “Shagging on the Boulevard”.

I blame Anne Murray. Not about the poppification of country music, but for everything else. War, hunger, disease? All Anne Murray’s fault.

Isn’t there a song about that?

Shoot, if we are gonna talk about how faith and shania were straddling the fence, we could go back to kenny rogers, the mandrell’s and all the other folks (including Dolly, btw) that were doing that way before Faith decided to start slithering in bedsheets and shania started showing her belly-button…

I’m still wrestling with this notion that Garth Brooks aided in the detraditionalisation (my coined word for the day) of country music. I’ll admit that many of his songs pushed the boundary of country music, but just as many reinforced the traditional side.

I’d also after that in the late 80’s (before Garth), country music was in more than just a little slump. There were some great things going on (Travis, Yoakam) but nothing bringing new blood to the genre. If Garth destroyed country- he saved it first. Yikes- I just scared myself by using the same argument folks use for the unconditional acceptance of Taylor Swift.

Anyway- I can see the argument that Garth signaled a change in the genre, but I think he built on what was there, rather than helped to destroy it. Other artists, influenced by, and trying to cash in on, what Garth had done, might be another story though.

Kelly, the difference is that when Kenny, Dolly and the Mandrells were doing pop-influenced music, traditionalists hadn’t been banished from the airwaves the way they are now.

Pretty sure “Dig Two Graves” is from Around the Bend, and it’s one of the top requests right now where I work. It sure is nice to have something to balance out Jimmy Wayne.