Johnny Cash Poems Being Turned Into New Album
When Brad Paisley included a song called “Gold All Over The Ground” on his recent album Love and War, we thought it was just a one-off occasion where one of today’s country artists took a poem from Johnny Cash and turned it into a song. The poem “Gold All Over The Ground” was first composed in March of 1967 about Johnny Cash’s wife June Carter, and was published in 2016 in the posthumous Johnny Cash poetry collection called Forever Words.
But apparently that’s just where the treasure trove of Johnny Cash poems and unfinished songs begins. Word is performers and songwriters in Nashville are being asked to participate in a project spearheaded by Johnny Cash’s son and caretaker of the Cash Cabin studio, John Carter Cash, putting music and sometimes words to Cash poems for a future release. Some of the artists that have been asked to participate so far include Jamey Johnson, Trick Pony bass player Ira Dean, and the late Chris Cornell, who apparently finished and recorded his contribution before his recent death.
“I had a great co-write today,” Ira Dean posted on social media back in April. “It’s not every day you have a co-write with the late Johnny Cash and get to work on one of his unfinished songs. I just wished you were still here John. It woulda been way more fun (thank you John Carter for letting me be able to do this.)”
In a recent interview with Jamey Johnson, he also mentioned the project.
“John Carter has a good number of poems that Johnny wrote,” Johnson says. “I say poems because they don’t have music to them. He’s working on an album where’s he’s pairing up these songs with songwriters from our day to finish up these Johnny Cash songs. One of them that I know he’s most proud of and you can’t get it anymore – he’s got Chris Cornell having finished one of these songs and then recorded it. I’m excited for it to come out. I got to do a couple of them. Part of it was just really cool to get this lyric in that we didn’t have a second verse to. So, John Carter and I sat down and wrote a second verse.”
This means that The Man in Black is not quite done contributing to country music just yet, despite his death in 2003. However, similar projects in the past of taking unfinished songs and putting them to music have stirred controversy, including The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams project released in 2011. Bob Dylan was put in charge of the effort, and distributed the unfinished songs to different artists including Jack White, Alan Jackson, Merle Haggard, Holly Williams, Levon Helm, and Sheryl Crow. However that project differed from the Johnny Cash effort because of controversy about how the project arose, and the chain of custody for the songs. In this instance Johnny Cash’s heirs and estate appear to be in charge.
No word at the moment on the name of the project, or when it might be released.
June 14, 2017 @ 6:47 pm
Pretty excited, i actually enjoyed the lost notebook Hank Willams album. Especially Jakob Dylan, holly williams, and jack white. Chriss cornell sounds promising, and john carter has one of my favorite songs.
June 15, 2017 @ 4:23 am
Same here. Looking forward to this project. It sounds like they are getting it right so far with JJ and Cornell. I even liked the Brad Paisley rendition of “Gold all over the Ground”.
June 14, 2017 @ 6:51 pm
I loved The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams album. Hopefully this will be in that vein.
June 15, 2017 @ 4:54 am
I wonder why Johnny didn’t turn these poems into songs.
June 15, 2017 @ 5:41 am
I like to think he had more creativity than he had time. You gotta make time for family, business, ect…
June 15, 2017 @ 12:12 pm
I can answer that they were not what he considered the cream of the crop or he didn’t get them finished….. think about if johnny thought the were that great he would have recorded them……same with the hank Williams stuff not to say some of this stuff wont turn out decent but I’m sure the bulk of it wont be that great I defintley wouldent be expecting none of it to be on par with I walk the line or folsom prison
June 15, 2017 @ 8:08 am
If these are all (mostly) in the vein of Gold All Over The Ground… This is one of the biggest things on my radar. Of the ones mentioned, I’m most intrigued about Ira Dean’s contribution. I’ve heard he is big into country music history/artifacts etc. Seems like something right up his alley.
The thing about Gold All Over The Ground that struck me the first time I heard it was even though it was a modern production, you could just tell it was penned by Cash. Lyrics like that are timeless. People don’t talk like that anymore, much less write songs like that.
June 15, 2017 @ 12:01 pm
“People don’t talk like that anymore, much less write songs like that.”
They lack the humility.
June 15, 2017 @ 12:03 pm
“So, John Carter and I sat down and wrote a second verse.”
Wish people would do more of this.
June 15, 2017 @ 12:54 pm
Sounds like a good time. excited to hear it
June 15, 2017 @ 2:47 pm
Jamey Johnson is working on Johnny Cash songs.
That is all I would like to contribute, I think it needs no further text.
June 18, 2017 @ 3:42 pm
This post of Trig’s deserves more comments. Here we have one of the greatest men in American country music, who left lyrics without music. This is exactly the condition for carrying a tradition forward and creating an opportunity for the newer generations to “set” the previous generation’s texts in a way that says “here’s what we can add to it, to make it better.” Not just to “add our thing” or “make it relevant to the post hip-hop generation,” but BETTER.
Isn’t that the whole point?
June 19, 2017 @ 11:38 am
This is excellent.