Johnny Cash's American Recordings

This title offers a superb investigation of what is arguably Johnny Cash's greatest album, focusing on his enduring mythology. When Johnny Cash signed to Rick Rubin's record label in 1993, he was a country music legend who, like his fellow Highwaymen Willie, Waylon and Kris, remained a fondly regarded yet completely marginalized Nashville figure, unheard on the radio and unseen on the charts. Cash's odyssey from oldies act to folk hero pivots on his first American Recordings album, a document of almost unbearable solitude and directness. It is a singular record, an instance in which a musical giant has been granted a kind of midnight reprieve, a chance to regain and renew his legend. Tony Tost illuminates the ways in which American Recordings is the crossroads where cultural, spiritual and mythic archetypes come together in the figure of The Man in Black. Ultimately, this is a guidebook to myth and mystery, a means of apprehending the stark beauty of Cash's greatest record, the sound of a man alone and fighting for his soul, one song at a time.

Autorentext

Tony Tost is a scholar and poet who lives in Seattle, Washington. The author of two poetry collections, he was the recipient of the Walt Whitman Award in 2003. He is currently completing a dissertation on myth, technology and the poetic imagination at Duke University.

Inhalt

Preface
Permanence (1)
Permanence (2)
Americana (1)
Independence Day
The Gift
Americana (2)
Delia
Let the Train Blow the Whistle
The Beast in Me
Drive On
Why Me, Lord
Bad Luck Wind
Cowboy Prayers
Precedence
To Be Free
He Had the Nerve and He Had the BloodWhere Are Your Guts?
Where the Train Goes Slow
Redemption
Like a SoldierPermanence (3)
The Man Who Couldn't Cry
The Old, Weird American