Listening to Youtube sort of randomly cycling, and Johnny Cash’s album American IV The Man Comes Around.
Normally I dislike country, the really whiney Lucille crap. I have to admit, listening to this album while considered country I wouldn’t class it the same. I can actually listen to this - the song Hurt for example, it is more contemplative, a man at the end of his life looking back thinking of what he would change. I checked online, he recorded it right after his wife passed and it just feels like a very different, a good bye rather than just entertainment.
“Hurt” wasn’t originally Country.
But even Trent Reznor acknowledges that it’s Johnny Cash’s song now and forever.
There are two different genres of music that are both called “country”, and it really bugs me, because folk country is one of my favorite genres, and pop country one of my least favorite. I have no idea how they both come to have the same name: So far as I can tell, the only thing they have in common is that the singers wear broad-brimmed hats.
LOL
I think the issue is we have country, western, blue grass, no shit for ancient imported in the cargo holds of ships of Scots and Irish indentured servants folk music, and stuff from other cultures [black from Africa, hispanic, mixed taino-african caribbean slaves, american indian, cajun and coonass]
I should amend that I detest the whiney modern 70s-80s crap like Lucille [fer gods sake, pick up a chick in a bar, marry her and make her take care of teh house and kids and get your ass out into the field and finish that damned harvest. Stop whining about stuff. I once got stuck for an hour on hold with Lucille as the fracking hold music.]
If you like “The Man Comes Around”, I recommend all the other volumes of his American Recordings as well. There’s a lot of stuff, I think six volumes (the last two of them released posthumously) and one 4 CD box set of outtakes and additional recordings from the last decade of Cash’s recording history with his rediscoverer and congenial producer, Rick Rubin. Note that those songs were a mix of traditional country and folk songs (there’s of course an overlap) and unique covers of then old and contemporary rock songs of artists you would never have expected in a context with Johnny Cash before (Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, Soundgarden, Beck, U2, Tom Petty, Simon and Garfunkel, the Beatles and so on). But actually, it was not so outstanding because in his beginnings for Sun Records, his music already had been a hybrid of country, folk and rockabilly.
ETA: there are many highlights in these recordings, but as an example I post my favorite of them all, his cover of Bonnie Prince Billie’s (Will Oldham) “I See A Darkness” with the writer as duet partner. If you ever had to fight with depression, you’ll understand:
I See A Darkness
But seriously, is there anyone who doesn’t like Johnny Cash?
June was alive when Hurt was recorded. It was recorded in 2002, and released in March 2003. June died in May of 2003. She appears in the music video as well.
You should watch Ken Burns ‘Country Music’
It shows how all that mingled together
And they focus on Cash a great deal.
It’s great. I promise.
off to see if it is streaming. I love suggestions of stuff to watch =)
someone over on facebook was discussing the firebird folktale so today had been shaping up as a stravinsky/tomita sort of day
Johnny Cash’s American Recordings albums were actually produced by Rick Rubin, who is known for hip-hop, alternative, and metal music. I think the pairing of his musical tastes and Cash’s talents was a great combination.
There is a lot of good country music that isn’t stereotypical or modern pop country. Some suggestions:
Turnpike Troubadours
Chris Stapleton
Jason Isbell
The Ol’ 97s
Margo Price
John Prine
