Johnny Cash: Fade to Black
by Matt PattersonLast night, I dreamed of Johnny Cash. He was sitting at the edge of my bed with a guitar, strumming and humming no tune in particular. Then he stopped, looked at me and said, “You got to play, son.” I woke with a start.
I remember when Cash died in September, 2003. It was strange that it hit me so hard. He had, after all, been ill for quite some time. I remember him being diagnosed with Shy-Drager Syndrome, a mysterious, degenerative nervous ailment. That turned out to have been a misdiagnosis, though he was still plagued with diabetes, and bouts of pneumonia which hospitalized him for long stretches. And, of course, the massive drug and alcohol abuse which characterized his early life had taken their toll as Johnny slid from middle into old age.
In the spring of 2003, his wife of over three decades, June Carter Cash (who wrote his most famous song, Ring Of Fire about their tempestuous romance) passed from the earth, leaving Johnny without his best friend and closest companion. It is a cliched truism that, when one lifelong partner dies, the other often follows in rapid succession. When two hearts beat together for so long, they can no longer beat independently, and so it proved for Mr. and Mrs. Cash.
I was raised in rural Colorado, with naught but country music to grace my ears through my early youth. I detested it so, the sad sameness of it all, the poverty of its vision. Country musicians made music seem so small. Then I heard Johnny.
Johnny was the antithesis of the other country artists who sounded so tinny from my parent’s eight track. Johnny was ten feet tall and loud as hell. It seemed like he was letting more of himself come out through his songs, all of himself – his voice dripped with a sepulchral dignity that allows for no affectation.
I remember hearing Long Black Veil for the first time. My God, I thought. If a ghost could sing about his betrayal, his love…it would sound just like this.
And the whirlwind, is in the thorn tree…
A few years before he died, Johnny had a dream that he was in Buckingham Palace, meeting the Queen of England. In that dream, she looked at him and said, “Why Johnny Cash, you’re like a whirlwind in a thorn tree!” He woke up, the phrase ringing in his head; he remembered it was a passage from Job.
The phrase refused to let him go, and he began to write. A song took shape from that dream, and over the next few years, he worked and reworked it hundreds of times. It became When The Man Comes Around, the title track for what would be his last album.
That song is Johnny Cash’s finest original creation, an extraordinary epilogue for a long and large life. Like any great piece of art, it is impossible to describe. It is country, gospel, folk, rock & roll – it is all of these things, and none. It is scary and comforting, ecstatic and foreboding. Sorrow and joy live side by side in the rhythm; Jesus playing guitar with Satan’s pick.
The whirlwind, is in the thorn tree…
I used to listen to Johnny Cash with my Grandpa. Grandpa loved Johnny, which always mystified me a little. Grandpa was so sunny, so cheerful, and Johnny was, well, so very dark. Unfailingly, unflinchingly dark. Dark enough to make The Man In Black the patron saint of Goth rockers from Mr. Reznor, to Nick Cave, to U2’s Bono (who has no small dark streak in his own soul).
And it is no wonder, really; Johnny’s voice fairly drips with impending doom, the famous quiver in the upper register hints at Apocalypse just around the corner. Johnny’s voice is a big, booming cave, vast and dark, sheltering both Preachers and Sinners, Angels and Devils, Lovers, and Murderers – long, long predating the ridiculous posturings of gangsta rap, Johnny boasted in song that one time he shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die.
So I was always a little surprised that Grandpa loved Johnny Cash so much. And when I first heard When The Man Comes Around, I knew that Grandpa would have loved it, too.
Johnny departed from this realm amidst a strange career resurgence. Producer Rick Rubin, known for his work with metal acts like Metallica, had picked Johnny up, dusted him off, and presented him to a new generation. The collaboration produced the critically acclaimed American Recordings albums, of which When The Man Comes Around is the best.
Johnny and Rubin especially received accolades for their haunting rendition of Trent Reznor’s Hurt, the video for which was nominated for a half dozen MTV video awards. It did not win the coveted “Best Video,” but winner Justin Timberlake, in a moment which led me to believe all was possibly not lost with the younger generation, proclaimed in his acceptance speech what everyone knew: Johnny was robbed.
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The video for Hurt is a shocking piece of film. A montage of images spanning Johnny’s entire career show his descent into frailty in all-too-vivid detail. It is sad, truly sad, to see a great man, any man, sink so before your eyes. Grandpa made that descent over four years, but in my mind, it seems just like that video; sped up and slowed down at the same time, forever wrapped up in a few painful moments.
In the years since Johnny has been gone, there has been much buzzing about the man and his work. It seems we are just beginning to realize that Johnny was perhaps a little too comfortable hanging out with the inmates of Folsom Prison, where his most incendiary concert was recorded. It seems a lot of people are only now realizing the depths from which Johnny sang.
Maybe most people don’t realize why they love Johnny Cash. I don’t think we should worry about it too much. We don’t need to ask what Johnny’s songs mean, or why they call to us like they do. The intellect may strip away lyrics and melodies, in search of ‘why’, but that is a fool’s quest. The only meaning that matters is embedded in the music itself, in the trademark boom/chick/boom rhythm that beats like the Mother Heart we hear in the womb. To appreciate this, we need, thank God, no intellect. Just a soul.
Johnny Cash died on September 12. It would have been Grandpa’s 81st birthday.
I remembered something as I woke from my dream last night. Years ago, I was troubled by which direction I should take, what I should be. I asked my Grandpa what he thought I should do. “You got to play, son,” he said.
And maybe that’s why I woke with a start last night. In the years since Grandpa died, in the years since Johnny died, I have done everything but.
Matt Patterson is a columnist and commentator whose work has appeared in The Washington Examiner, The Baltimore Sun, and Pajamas Media. He is the author of “Union of Hearts: The Abraham Lincoln & Ann Rutledge Story.” His email is mpatterson.column@gmail.com.
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43 Comments
greats like johnny Cash should be remembered for what they did, and who they were- not what became of them. Any descent into illness or infirmity is ugly to behold but a sometimes necessary part of our human journey.
What Mr Cash provided for us was a life full of value and appeal. One that crossed genres and generations.
The rock world was thrilled with him as well; Nick Lowe was his son-in-law for a time… his biopic was Joaquin Phoenixs' best work by far.
You have NEVER heard gospel until you hear Johnny Cash's stylings- it's been known to convert heathens instantly. Atheists take a day or so…
Johnny Cash was the man who made it Ok for me to explore country. I lived in Texas 16 years and avoided country with a passion. Once I discovered Johnny Cash, shortly before he died, for myself, he opened the door and is one of the only country singers I will listen to.
I never really liked "hurt" but that was before Johnny sang it. His version made me understand and appreciate it.
"May Way" is for me Sinatra's eulogy. Johnny wouldn't be remembered for a similar song. "Hurt" is Johnny's eulogy.
June didn't write "Ring". As Cash's first wife makes clear in her book, Johnny wrote it and gave it to June to help her out and they made up the little lie…oh well
Certain singers – Cash foremost among them – sing from a particularly dark corner of Christianity. It's a knowledge that if Jesus is our personal savior, then it is we who are his personal tormentors. We are the ones driving the nails into his wrists, not some anonymous Roman 2000 years ago. That pain – the crushing guilt of it all – runs through Johnny's music. Trent Reznor wrote "Hurt" as a sort of anti love song. For Cash, it's gospel.
Great article. I can't wait for the 20-track American VI to come out later this year.
amen brother
I enjoyed "Walk the Line" and thought it was well made, but the lazy trope of using the worst moments of an artists life as the frame for a bio-pic is getting tired. Lousy marriages, drug abuse, alcoholism…
Cash, Ray Charles, Howard Hughes, Patsy Cline, and on and on… are so much more than that, both as artists and human beings, but because Hollywood can't craft a compelling story from anything else — that's what were left with to remember them by.
You look at bio-pics from an earlier era — Cohan, Jolson, Pasteur, Zola, Curie … those were films about the arc of brilliance and accomplishment.
From my earliest memory, there were a few people that I saw regularly on TV who almost seemed like a distance cousin or uncle that would visit my family through the TV. I remember clearly thinking of Johnny Cash in that way when I was a small tot. There was a feeling of goodness and sincerity about him that struck me deeply. And his songs spoke to you. They weren't just lyrics. The songs spoke to you as if he was having a conversation with you.
His version of "Ghost Riders in the Sky" sends chills through me.
He had a song called "One Piece at a Time" about a man who worked in a Cadillac plant who stole on, one piece at a time. Near Welch, OK there's a man named Patch, who made his fortune in coal mining. He built a car like the one described in the song, and gave it to Cash. Cash drove it in the video.
Later, Welch wanted to build a new community center. Cash put on a benefit concert, and paid for the new community center, in one night.
I thought "Something The Lord Made" was well done. But I might just be a sucker for that kind of thing.
'Walk' was good as Hollywood biopics go- the narrative felt the usual need to create conflicts when none were needed- although Robert Patrick's turn (talk about terrifically underrated actors) as his dad was stellar.
What was truly excellent was Phoenix and Witherspoon. Best work of their careers…
absolutely. It is why his gospel work is so friggin' powerful. He finds the essential truths in our weaknesses…
Its' as they say.. if you hear a sermon on the evils of drugs (or any other vice here), who would be more effective… someone who's never touched a drop/vial, or someone that's been to the bottom of the dung pile and managed to pull themselves back out of it?
Johnny was the man, not just "the man in black". They don't come around that often. The only one left, now, is Dylan. Truly, when the whirlwind is in the thorn trees, a hard rain's a gonna fall.
While Walk the Line did cheat severely by not touching on Cash's deep faith, it seems appropriate for bios to show the nasty bits…the older bios you mention make it look like those men never farted. They were good movies, but one hardly feels they were real portraits of their subject. The newer ones you cite show their subjects grievous faults, but they had them, and they were part of the emotional forces that created their brilliance. How do you do an accurate bio without showing that part? Also, I must make mention of what I think is the best musical film/bio: "Coal Miner's Daughter." (of course the 3rd type of bio is "Amadeus," awesome movie but pretty much fiction through and through)
I'm with you on this one maat.. if you're going to show us the climb to the top, show us where they climbed from, or where they fell. I've no interest in a movie about "Mr. (or Mrs.) Perfect"… so they were great to start with, stayed great, and ended great.. so I'll be interested in hearing about mr(s). perfect, because… ????
I'm with you on this one maat.. if you're going to show us the climb to the top, show us where they climbed from, or where they fell. I've no interest in a movie about "Mr. (or Mrs.) Perfect"… so they were great to start with, stayed great, and ended great.. so I'll be interested in hearing about mr(s). perfect, because… ????
I'm talking about the framing device — which of course is the whole story. Warts and all is fine, but when the framing device is based on a wart it unfairly defines who that person was.
Given the choice between the two, I'll take the smarter and more honest tack of focussing on what truly defined these folks, and that's their brilliance and artistry.
the Jolson Story is warts and all… But also follows the creative arc of Jolson's career even as he eventually chooses the limelight over his wife, Ruby Keeler.
Showing the nasty bits, as you put it, is something we agree on. This current crop focusses on them. They are the whole story, the music simply the soundtrack to it.
As far as "Walk the Line" cheating when it came to Cash's faith, which was very much who he was, even I can't ask modern Hollywood to do that. Like howling at the moon.
Another singer in the same tradition, Bill Mallonee of the Vigilantes of Love, put it this way, "Sure, I could just do happy gospel songs, but sometimes you've got to hear the bad news before the good news means anything to you."
I've played guitar for many years. During my early years the music of choice was Heavy Metal, so there was a lot of music which we thought was "uncool". Johnny Cash on the other hand was one of those rare cases. He was, as has been described here, just dark enough to appeal to a bunch of "Headbangers". We always revamped his songs into (Very very bad) metal songs. Unfortuanately artiists like Cash are an endangered species.
The one thing I really did not like, was, that towards the end of his life people all of sudden "Found" Johnny. He was never lost. He was always there, people just never bothered to look!
Two words: Dewey Cox.
my grandparents also got me into johnny cash, and im glad he did because he was a great talent that is missed!
If I could've been any place at any time rather than where I was, it would've been in the Sun Studios when Johnny, Elvis, Roy, Carl, and Jerry Lee were laying the tracks. And other great ones, too.
People loved Cash because he so real, and Southern. That's part of what got folks about Elvis. He could have been them, to so many. He transcended, somehow, and they loved him for it.
I used to watch his TV show religiously.
On YouTube check out the Johnny Cash Christmas Show '77.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMdQuLyC7dI
Beautiful tribute to both Cash and your grandfather, Matt… may both rest in peace.
I was barely 16. It was 1956 and Mom, Dad & I were driving from NY to visit my brother at Lackland AFB when we pulled into a little dive in I-don't-remember-where, Texas. Someone dropped a coin into the juke box and out came "I Walk The Line." I'd never heard any singer with that kind of strength, that kind of depth. 53 years later, I still haven't. In those early days of Rock and Roll, he surpassed the rebelliousness of all the other musical rebels of the time. He never fit in anyone's pigeon hole, Cash was a true original.
[...] *Johny Cash: Fade to Black, by Matt Patterson [...]
You Got to Play Son, I mean like right now. If Johnny Cash says to play, THEN PLAY.
The pattern for Walk the Line should have been The Apostle, the flawed follower of Jesus who has a dark side he has to struggle with, instead of just doing another 80s gotta get clean movie. You would never know from Walk the Line that his biggest selling albums in his early years were the Gospel albums, instead you get the impression that after his record audition, he left that all behind.
Sorry, folks, but I don't get the whole Cash cult thing. The man couldn't sing a lick and his songs were mediocre at best. And as someone else hinted, until recently he was an also-ran in country music. While everybody knew his name, he was nowhere near the kind of god people have made him out to be over the last decade.
I guess when you're swimming in a cesspool, every turd looks like a fish.
Not that Cash was a turd–that would be going too far–but he was far less a fish than the true greats like Snow, Williams, Cline, etc. were.
The only thing I can say is that you seem to lack taste (or else just want to get a rise out of people). Cash's voice and his lyrics are both exceptionally strong. Could he sing opera? No, but his voice had distinctiveness and authority and he sang songs within his range. As for his lyrics, there are few songs that can match "Folsom Prison Blues," "The Man Comes Around," or "Give My Love to Rose," to mention just a few.
Hear that sound? It's thousands of Cash fans mounting up, lock & loading and coming to KICK YOUR @$$!! ;-D
Cash may be an acquired taste–for me he's one of those artists you suddenly are (maybe) old? mature? enough to appreciate, like Billie Holiday, who for the life of me I couldn't understand why my parents liked until my "ooh now I get it" moment. And the fact that Cash couldn't get a record deal later in his career spoke volumes more for the industry at the time than his skill. Wait a few years, then give him another listen. He'll be waiting.
And thanks to the author for a lovely piece!
To me, there was always such a deep hurt in the man's eyes. Made you want to pat him on the back and invite him out for a beer.
And, he was a masterful singer.
I think we all miss johnny.
Why link to an anti-GB propaganda video? (When the Man Comes Around). There's better versions on YouTube.
I don't consider him a god but he was for real. That's what made him a great musician. He didn't worry about laying down the perfect track in the studio but his voice and rhythm were completely unique and unmatched. Willie Nelson is a lot like that too. Forget about genre and just listen. Be careful though, you might learn to like it.
Yes. The bio-pis of today are Sotomayor approved – empathy inducing. The bio-pics of yesteryear were inspiring. What you chose to do with your inspiration is up to you, and when you find out your hero was all too human you can relate, and forgive, but where do you go in the absence of accomplishment with a mere mortal? Who follows in the footsteps of empathy?
Thanks for your contribution. You are the messiah of music.
Turd.
My first exposures to Johnny Cash were the singles in the late 1950's when I was about ten years old. I had gotten my first transistor radio. Growing up around Philly, there were lots of different styles, particularly what is now referred to as doo-wap. But, I was particularly a fan of what was then called country & western or possibly rock-a-billy. Guys like Ray Charles, Johnny Cash, the Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, Elvis, and Roy Orbison all come to mind. Maybe that's why later I so enjoyed stuff that Gram Parsons did with the Byrds and Burrito's. In addition to songs like "Walk the Line" and Ring of Fire" I remember particularly liking the ballads such as "Dark as a Dungeon" and "I still Miss Someone." What makes Johnny Cash special is that he was a great songwriter. Like Dylan, there are others who may have covered his songs who were more talented musically, but nothing beats doing your own material . . particularly when it's that classic.
As far as "Walk the Line" I think Joaquin and Reese were both absolutely sensational.
Because I so thoroughly enjoyed that picture, I am probably not a good objective judge. I guess I felt the movie's central theme was how June (even with all her own issues) and her faith helped save Johnny and bring him to his. The relationship with his father and his brother obviously impacted his self-esteem as well. Dramatically, it was not a bad place to end it; if it was a bit of a short change, it wasn't a major shortcoming.
I never listen to Country Music, but I have 5 CD's of Johnny Cash in my CD case in my car and to this day I listen to one of them once a week. He always seemed to be talking to the common man and touching on the universal subjects of life. There will always be a place for Johnny Cash in my life in both the black clothes I wear every day and my respect for the values he held when he was alive.
I'm probably too young to "get" Johnny Cash. Alas, my fondest memory of him is seeing the effect he had on my dad, when during a Billy Graham crusade concert, he brought my father to tears with his tail of struggle and repentence. My father went off to Vietnam in '67, served some of his tour at "beach resort" called Cam Rahn Bay. While there, he purchased a reel to reel music player. My brother and I found it in our basement sometime in the '90s. There was tracks of the Beach Boys and few other '60s groups. Let's see if I can get to my point here. My father was a man very different from Cash. While he came to Christ in the early '70s, he had been a very moral fellow long before that. So, being something of an anti-Cash, I was touched to no end seeing him rejoice at Johnny's tale of redemption.
All may not be lost on the younger generation, but Justin Freaking Timberlake getting an award over the video for "Hurt" proved that all was certainly lost in the den of idiots that is MTV. And nothing has changed there since.
As someone who struggles with depression, Cash is salve to my soul. It takes a person who knows the depths of Hell to understand what Cash is saying in his music, especially the hymns.
That said, I figure you wrote what you did just to piss people off. Thats ok. I see through it.
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