I wonder what people would think about this album if they didn’t know who Johnny Cash was. Who does this guy think he is, covering Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, and a Beatles song with his primary instrument being an acoustic guitar? And even with that, does he honestly think he can play guitar? But no, this is Johnny Cash, the legendary Man in Black. Acquiring American Recordings IV after his death, listening to Cash sing becomes all too ethereal. American Recordings IV is the last album released during Cash’s lifetime. His pure emotion, even in his old age, shines through the speakers, a call to his past and a call to his listeners. This album is Johnny Cash, and nothing more.
One can’t say much about the music on the album. Mostly every song features Johnny on guitar, strumming a relatively simple chord progression. A slew of backing instruments accompany him, usually a dark piano playing the lower keys to mix well with Cash’s voice. However, the trouble is the actual piano. The production and mixing of the piano sounds incredibly cheesy, almost a cheap Casio sound.
Bridge Over Troubled Water is the worst of these songs. The piano sounds just as the other songs, and Johnny’s guitar is just fine. The real problem is the synthesized sound that floats overtop the other instruments. It’s so hard to believe that Rick Rubin, a master producer, went with that terrible sound on the recording. The whole song comes across as incredibly manufactured, taking away from what makes Johnny Cash such a fantastic artist. However, the simpler songs take the prize, simply because Johnny Cash plays with nothing but emotion.
What may be his most heartfelt song in his later career comes in the form of
Hurt. The song originally appeared on Nine Inch Nail’s The Downward Spiral, composed of course by Trent Reznor. However, the Cash version rivals the Nine Inch Nails recording. Although Johnny Cash covering Trent Reznor seems a bit of a stretch, it makes sense. The Downward Spiral, an album about drug addiction, used this song as the closer, a reflection on drug addiction and its consequences. Cash applies this vantage point to his life. The song starts simply with an acoustic guitar riff, but grows and falls gloriously with haunting repeating piano strikes and Cash’s trademark deep voice. The lyrics, so simple and telling, fit Cash’s life and battles perfectly. Even further adding to the atmosphere, the award winning and critically acclaimed music video. It stands among the top music videos of all time, taking candid shots of an aged Cash, clearly reflecting on his life and mixing them with clips of his past. Even Trent Reznor appreciated and loved the song, saying “I just lost my girlfriend, because that song isn't mine anymore.”
However,
Hurt is certainly not the only good song on the album. Aside from recovering from drug addiction, Johnny Cash found Christianity. A few songs, including the album opener and original composition
The Man Comes Around make references to the Book of Revelation, at one point having Johnny recite a section of it in spoken word. Rick Rubin throws in his own production touch, putting Johnny’s spoken voice behind an 8 track. The 2004 movie Dawn of the Dead uses this song as the opening song, giving a bit of a morbid tinge about the song. With this album being the last released in Cash’s lifetime, the subject matter of death and the apocalypse is so terribly telling and foreshadowing. While the song is much more spoken word than singing, the guitar playing is upbeat and a throwback to Cash’s earlier years.
Personal Jesus, featuring a guitar riff written by John Frusciante, takes a different spin on Depeche Mode’s song and certainly an opposite spin from Marilyn Manson’s interpretation. While Manson’s version took a sexual tinge about the song, Cash puts the idea that Jesus is personal to everyone, saying you can “reach out and touch faith.”
Personal Jesus puts a sultry, bluesy style on the song, sounding almost like if Ray Charles and Johnny Cash worked together on a song. Once again, that makes another strange foreshadowing to Cash and Charles’ impending death.
Moreover, Johnny Cash throws out yet another voice. He takes it back to his Folsom Prison days including a recording of a song he performed at Folsom Prison,
Give My Love to Rose. The song is unmistakably country. The song takes a much more reflective feel than the Folsom Prison version, especially with the lack of his lacking band from that era and a slower tempo. However, Johnny’s inflections and singing style is almost a carbon copy from the Folsom Prison recording, giving an incredibly ethereal feel about the song.
Streets of Laredo, a song from an even earlier Johnny Cash and a traditional classic, is another song about death and yet another foreshadowing.
Streets of Laredo, while nothing to marvel at, is just a typical Johnny Cash song. The piano does its job well, playing sparsely much like in
Hurt and the guitar riff has its country tinges, especially in the chromatic passing tones.
American Recordings IV is the final curtain call for Johnny Cash, showing a perfect summary of his life. No album better shows all sides of the man, from the hard, gritty man who played concerts at prisons to the battling drug addict to the newly found Christian. Even in his old age, Cash maintains his trademark singing voice and simple guitar playing, never losing any integrity or emotion. A reflection on his life, it almost seems that Johnny knows the end is near, getting everything he has left onto the vinyl before he goes.
Recommended Tracks:
The Man Comes Around
Hurt
I Hung My Head
Personal Jesus
I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry
We’ll Meet Again
