In spite of being a fan since the 1960s, I only saw Johnny Cash one time, and it was during what many consider his lost decade, the 1980s. It was the first time I’d had a press pass to a concert. It took place at the Oregon State Fair on a blazing hot late-August afternoon. I don’t remember a thing he sang, but I do remember joining the press scrum backstage after the show, and a sweat-soaked Man in Black looked exhausted as he answered a few questions.
Johnny Cash had fallen out of fashion. No longer riding the top of the charts as he did in the ‘60s and ‘70s in the wake of his second wave of fame spurred by his prison concert albums, he was playing the state fair circuit. His longtime label, Columbia, didn’t know what to do with him. At least a couple of albums worth of material he recorded were shelved.
Now Sony Legacy has released one of those projects, dug out of the archives by John Carter Cash, Johnny and June’s son. These songs for the most part were unfinished, many lacking lead guitar parts and other finishing touches. So John Carter called in some of the stalwarts of Nashville’s current roots music scene to polish them up so they’d be presentable. They included Marty Stuart, who played on the original sessions, in addition to producer and guitarist extraordinaire Buddy Miller and Dobro player Jerry Douglas.
The result is a little uneven, but what’s good is very good.
Among the best are two duets with June Carter Cash. “Babe Ride Easy” is a peppy, uptempo shuffle written by Texan Richard Dobson. It was also recorded by Johnny’s daughter Carlene Carter as a duet with Dave Edmunds, and it’s full of clever lyrics – just the type of song that Johnny and June could roll off their tongues as easy as breathing. The other is a sweet love song by the classic Bakersfield singer-songwriter Tommy Collins, “Don’t You Think It’s Come Our Time.” A real gem. Another classic is one more duet, Hank Snow’s “I’m Movin’ On” with Waylon Jennings. The craggy voices of these two old outlaws harmonize unexpectedly well, and it’s a fine rendition – the kind of song Johnny and Waylon could probably lay down in one take. Also at the top of my list of favorites is Paul Kennerly’s “Rock and Roll Shoes,” a twangy, shuffling homage to the life of a traveling musician. A Merseyside-native Brit, Kennerly is another oft-overlooked writer of great country songs who played in a lot of solid bands including one of Emmylou Harris’s, to whom he was married for a few years.
The album opens with the title song, a textbook kind of Johnny Cash song – the tale of a lost soul pushed beyond endourance to commit what’s now called “suicide by cop.” The one that I think would have hit the charts if ever released as a single is “She Used to Love Me A Lot.” Johnny’s in very strong voice on this one, an acoustic Southwestern-style ballad with twangy baritone guitar accents.
The rest I find to be mostly album filler. “After All” is a Jimmie Rodgers-style parlor song, a syrupy love song in waltz time with violins and Fender Rhodes among the instrumentation. “If I Told You Who It Was” is a Shel Silverstein-style joke song that Johnny carries off well, but it’s still slight. “Call Your Mother” is a very ‘80s song about divorce, which to its credit is sad but not maudlin. “Tennessee” is a pleasant homage to the state where Johnny lived most of his life, with a big choir of schoolkids singing on the final chorus. “I Drove Her Out Of My Mind” is an odd song that I find mean-spirited; a bitter ex-husband buys a Cadillac in which to take the ex on a one-way ride off Lover’s Leap. And “I Came To Believe” is a solid Cash-style gospel number that I know he felt very strongly about, having just emerged from a stint in rehab. I respect Johnny’s faith a lot, but this type of song doesn’t do much for me.
The album closes with a “what might have been” bonus track. It’s a remix of “She Used To Love Me A Lot,” with the kind of production that the song might’ve received had it been recorded during Johnny’s big comeback in the late ’90s. It takes a strong song and makes it absolutely haunting. I like both versions. Here’s the official video, which uses the remixed version.
I hope it doesn’t sound like I don’t like this album. I do. I can find songs I’m less than crazy about on even my favorite Johnny Cash albums. Out Among The Stars is truly a lost classic Cash album, and I’m absolutely delighted that it has been released.
Legacy, 2014
