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Source: Japan SHM-CD Remaster
Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar is the debut album by American country star Johnny Cash, released on October 11, 1957. The album contained four of his hit singles: "I Walk the Line," "Cry! Cry! Cry!," "So Doggone Lonesome," and "Folsom Prison Blues." It was re-issued on July 23, 2002 as an expanded edition, under the label Varese Vintage, containing five bonus tracks, three being alternate versions of tracks already present on the original LP. In 2012, Columbia Records reissued the album with 16 additional non-album Sun tracks as part of its 63-disc Johnny Cash: The Complete Columbia Album Collection box set.
This was one of the first albums ever issued on Sam Phillips' Sun Records label.
Background:
Cash auditioned for a place on the music label Sun Records in 1955, but failed to impress its founder Sam Philips after presenting himself as a gospel singer. Cash was told to come back with a more commercial sound, as gospel wouldn't sell. He returned with the songs "Hey Porter!" and "Cry! Cry! Cry!" and subsequently released them as his debut single on Sun Records in July 1955. On the recording, he was backed by Luther Perkins on guitar and Marshall Grant on bass, dubbed "The Tennessee Two" by Philips. ("Hey Porter" was not included on the original Sun album, but was included in later reissues by other labels.)
"Cry! Cry! Cry!" became a commercial success, entering the country charts at number fourteen.
His second single, "Folsom Prison Blues", was released in December 1955 and reached the country Top Five in early 1956.
His final single on With His Hot and Blue Guitar, "I Walk the Line", continued his success, reaching number one on the country charts and staying there for six weeks, eventually crossing over into the pop Top 20.
Folsom Prison Blues:
"Folsom Prison Blues" is a song written in 1953[4] and first recorded in 1955 by American singer-songwriter Johnny Cash. The song combines elements from two popular folk styles, the train song and the prison song, both of which Cash continued to use for the rest of his career. It was one of Cash's signature songs. It was the eleventh track on his debut album With His Hot and Blue Guitar and it was also included (same version) on All Aboard the Blue Train. A live version, recorded among inmates at Folsom State Prison itself, became a #1 hit on the country music charts in 1968. In June 2014, Rolling Stone ranked it No. 51 on its list of the 100 greatest country songs of all time.
Cash was inspired to write this song after seeing the movie Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison (1951) while serving in West Germany in the United States Air Force at Landsberg, Bavaria (itself the location of a famous prison). Cash recounted how he came up with the line "But I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die": "I sat with my pen in my hand, trying to think up the worst reason a person could have for killing another person, and that's what came to mind."
Cash took the melody for the song and many of the lyrics from Gordon Jenkins's 1953 Seven Dreams concept album, specifically the song "Crescent City Blues". Jenkins was not credited on the original record, which was issued by Sun Records. In the early 1970s, after the song became popular, Cash paid Jenkins a settlement of approximately US$75,000 following a lawsuit.
The song was recorded at the Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee on July 30, 1955. The producer was Sam Phillips, and the musicians were Cash (vocals, guitar), Luther Perkins (guitar), and Marshall Grant (bass). Like other songs recorded during his early Sun Records sessions, Cash had no drummer in the studio, but replicated the snare drum sound by inserting piece of paper (like a dollar bill) under the guitar strings and strumming the snare rhythm on his guitar. The song was released as a single with another song recorded at the same session, "So Doggone Lonesome". Early in 1956, both sides reached #4 on the Billboard C&W Best Sellers chart.
Live recording, 1968:
Cash opened most all of his concerts with "Folsom Prison Blues," after greeting the audience with his trademark introduction, "Hello, I'm Johnny Cash," for decades. Cash performed the song at Folsom Prison itself on January 13, 1968, and this version was eventually released on the At Folsom Prison album the same year. That opening version of the song is more up-tempo than the original Sun recording. According to Michael Streissguth, the cheering from the audience following the line "But I shot a man in Reno / just to watch him die" was added in post-production. A special on the Walk the Line DVD indicates that the prisoners were careful not to cheer at any of Cash's comments about the prison itself, fearing reprisal from guards. The performance again featured Cash, Perkins and Grant, as on the original recording, together with Al Casey (guitar) and W.S. Holland (drums).
Released as a single, the live version reached #1 on the country singles chart, and #32 on the Hot 100, in 1968. Pitchfork Media placed this live version at number 8 on its list of "The 200 Greatest Songs of the 1960s." The live performance of the song won Cash the Grammy Award for Best Country Vocal Performance, Male, the first of four he won in his career, at the 1969 Grammy Awards.
Original recording, 1957:
01. "The Rock Island Line" Unknown 02:11
02. "I Heard That Lonesome Whistle" Jimmie Davis, Hank Williams 02:25
03. "Country Boy" 01:49
04. "If the Good Lord's Willing" Jerry Reed 01:44
05. "Cry! Cry! Cry!" 02:29
06. "Remember Me" Stuart Hamblen 02:01
07. "So Doggone Lonesome" 02:39
08. "I Was There When It Happened" Jimmie Davis, Fern Jones 02:17
09. "I Walk the Line" 02:46
10. "The Wreck of the Old '97" Traditional (probably Charles Noell); arranged Cash 01:48
11. "Folsom Prison Blues" 02:51
12. "Doin' My Time" Jimmie Skinner 02:40
Bonus: Radio Live 1958-59
13. Rock Island Line (Haven't Recorded it Yet) [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 02:31
14. Folsom Prison Blues [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 03:02
15. Reserve For Youth Training Program” spot [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 01:12
16 Don't Take Your Guns To Town [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 03:11
17. Get Rhythm (“Our latest release on Sun”) [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 02:27
18. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 02.22
19. So Doggone Lonesome [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 02:39
20. Cry Cry Cry [Radio Live Bonus 1956] 02:00
These are vintage radio broadcast transcription discs (at times you can “hear” the vinyl which adds flavor). The sound quality is amazing. Country Style USA is from 1958, Guest Star is from 1959. That’s all the info I have. I received these many years ago in a trade and transferred them from cassette. This is as good as it gets.
Country Style USA was a radio program syndicated by the US Army Band and Recruiting Services and broadcast as a recruiting tool for them.
Produced by the U.S. Treasury Department in the 1940s and 1950s as a public service program, Guest Star features a different often top-name "guest star" (singer, actor, comedian) each week to promote the sales of savings bonds previoulsy circulated with incorrect dates of 1958 & 1959.
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Johnny Cash US 1957
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Johnny Cash US 1957
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Johnny Cash US 1957
Size: 189 MB
Bitrate: 320
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Ripped by: ChrisGoesRock
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Compliation albums! Never really given the same kudos as 'proper' studio albums or even 'Live' albums, and yet....there have been a few Compilation albums that have surpassed even the greatest of all studio albums; Lenny Kaye's 'Nuggets' of course, the magisterial 'Pillows & Prayers' and virtually anything on Sarah Records or Bam-Caruso.
But, as far as I am concerned, the most important Comp in my record buying lifetime simply has to be Dan Treacy's Whaam Records catch-all 'All For Art....And Art For All'. This record is one of the very few that ABSOLUTELY changed my life!!
'All For Art....' was released in the Summer of 1984, but I didn't find it till the December of that year. I was going through a 60s psychedelic phase at the time, and when I found this in the record racks I assumed with it's images of Andy Warhol, band names like The Laughing Apple, and song titles like 'Only The Sky Children Know' that this was a collection of obscure 60s tracks. On first play, when I realised it was a contemporary collection, I was a little disappointed, but very quickly the thrill of the music took me over.
This album is bookended by TWO of my Top 10 Favourite songs OF ALL TIME....two EPICS that still make my heart flutter and my head reel furiously....but we'll get to them later.
First, let's deal with The Mixers....their first track on the album, 'Never Find Time' thwacks along driven by a snapping snare that conjures up a tooth-coroding mix of The Jam and The Honeycombs...and is every bit as sweet. Later they serve up 'Love Hurts' laced through with acidic Lalala's....a song SO 1960s it's wearing Cuban Heels.
Next up, The Page Boys.....and a song called 'Honey'. Anachronistic contemporary drum machines and Casio-like keyboards are swept away by a recurring 'Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah' motif (starting to get the picture?). A song that manages to sound 60s and 80s in the same three minutes.
Tangerine Experience's 'Only The Sky Children Know' probably sounds exactly like you imagine. Like some huge Prog Rock anthem played by sussed hep-cats....it's a gigantic, multi-hued explosion of psychedelic wibblery.
It's left up to The Pastels to follow it up. Aaaaah....The Pastels!!! Here sounding SO young, pale and undernourished it's a wonder social services weren't called. 'I Wonder Why' is a song so fey you want to give it a mug of soup! But it's beauty is every bit as comforting.
Ex-Swell Map Jowe Head follows up with 'Lolita', a weird melange of whistling, fractured vocals and erratic guitar playing. It's the kind of song that could probably give David Tibet nightmares. He appears later with a track called 'February' which is even stranger. Like an underwater medieval folk song....it took me YEARS to appreciate his contributions to the album, I was probably just too young at the time.
The Direct Hits contribute two of the very best tracks on the album, 'Girl In The Picture' and 'What Killed Aleister Crowely'. 'GITP' is a beautifully crafted pop song of pure unrequited love as the vocalist sits in his room fantasising about the titular Girl. It could also be about stalking!! I love the swooshy phasing effect on this track. '...Aleister Crowely...' is another perfectly produced mini-masterpiece which ends with the threatening "I can see through Aleister Crowely's eyes..." I have to confess I didn't know who Crowely was at the time I bought the album, and finding out obviously changed the entire song for me.
Dan Treacy's hand is, obviously, all over this record, from producing it, designing the sleeve, running the label, and being the main man in The Television Personalities and it is they who bring Side One to an end with the wondrous 'The Dream Inspires'. I've often wondered if this is a song about Oxford, but it is SO good that who really cares?
On to Side Two:
Kicking off with The Mad Hatters, 'Dancing With The Dead' is almost pure 1967...in fact the intro is reminiscent of (the then psychedelic) Status Quo's 'Ice In The Sun'.
Acoustic strumming, a harp, and the most tremulous voice imaginable...yes, it's Jed Dmochowski and his beautifully fragile lament 'I'm Sad'.
Then comes The Laughing Apple and the brilliant, vibrant, amphetamine hit of 'Wouldn't You', featuring on vocals Alan McGee....yes, THAT Alan McGee. The Laughing Apple would later change it's name to Biff Bang Pow and re-record 'Wouldn't You' in a rather over-produced fashion. This is the better version.
The Gifted Children are next with the brilliant 'My Favourite Films', a song that manages to namecheck Malcolm MacDowell, Albert Finney, Tom Courtney, Oliver Reed, Carol White, Wendy Craig and Rita Tushingham. What? No Terence Stamp or Julie Christie?
Which leaves us with the BIG TWO!
The opening track on this album is 'In The Afternoon' by The Revolving Paint Dream; this is, as I've said, one of my favourite songs of all time. It begins quietly enough with what sounds like the oldest, tinniest drum machine, punctuated with occasional LOUD snare whacks. On top of this is a cyclical guitar pattern, and then the vocals kick in; "Dont Go..." they beg, DRENCHED in echo and reverb.
The verse builds and builds until it collapses under it's own overwroughtness into the chorus "In the afternoon....we made love" The song is full of snatches of impassioned pleading, "Sometimes feelings go beyond words....and I don't feel real at all", "Maybe I could make it better?", "Now this lust was always love" "When she goes away....." Eventually the voices become so overlapping and echoey it begins to sound like a Gregorian Chant and becomes so loud in the mix, it distorts....or that could just be my copy! The Revolving Paint Dream would later release a proper album of their own with a re-recorded version of this track complete with female lead vocals....but THIS is the ABSOLUTE mutt's plums!!! It can still make me cry even just writing about it.
The album ends with another Television Personalities track 'Happy All The Time', and WHAT an incredible song!! "She paints an earthquake" Dan mutters at the start before we're off into another cyclical guitar pattern, heavy drums and weird keyboard effects. It's a song about unhappiness, maybe even depression; "Ha ha ha said the clown// As he fell down// And the audience laughed and cheered//But they never saw the tears" sings Dan before the mighty chorus; "And I'm just looking for rainbows//In a star filled sky//And I'm just waiting for the sun to shine//I remember somebody told me//That God is yours and mine//But nobody ever told me that pigs could fly".
After about three minutes the song ends, then comes a bunch of weird noises, the sound of a tape being rewound, and then three false re-starts before the song goes back into the chorus. If Jean Luc Godard ever produced a pop record, THIS is what it would sound like. The false starts and weird edits give the song a poignancy that has stuck with me for almost 25 years now.
This album would always make my list of Top 10 Albums Of All Time, even if it just had those two tracks on it.
The album has never been properly re-issued on CD, but a grab-bag of all of Whaam! Records output was released under the title of 'Whaam Bam Thank You Dan' which contains a good 75% of the tracks that appeared on this album.
01. Revolving Paint Dream - In The Afternoon
02. Television Personalities - I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives
03. The Mixers - Never Find Time
04. The Page Boys - You're My Kind Of Girl
05. Tangerine Experience - Only The Sky Children Know
06. Direct Hits - Too Shy
07. Television Personalities - The Dream Inspires
08. The Marble Staircase - Still Dreaming
09. 1000 Mexicans - The Art Of Love
10. The Mad Hatters - Dancing With The Dead
11. Jed Dmochowski - Part Of The World
12. Laughing Apple - Wouldn't You?
13. Television Personalities - Bike
14. The Page Boys - In Love With You
15. Direct Hits - Naughty Little Boys
16. The Gifted Children - My Favorite Films
17. The Marble Staircase - Dark Ages
18. Television Personalities - I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives
19. The Mixers - Love Hurts
20. The Gifted Children - Painting By Numbers
21. 1000 Mexicans - News Of You
22. Television Personalities - No One's Little Girl
23. Direct Hits - What Killed Aleister Crowley?
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Whaam Records
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Whaam Records
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