Johnny Cash

Country music patriarch Johnny Cash, the "Man in Black," has walked the line between rock and country since his early days as a rockabilly singer. Johnny Cash's songs' characteristic marching bass lines have influenced Waylon Jennings and others, while his deep, quavery baritone growl has become a trademark. A preeminent songwriter, Cash has been courted over the years by rock's elite, beginning with Dylan in the '60s. In 1994 Cash returned to the spotlight, boosted by the support of a whole new generation of fans — many of them alternative-rock aficionados — with the release of the stark (just vocals and acoustic guitar) American Recordings. Ill health slowed Cash down in the late '90s but did not stop his creative output.

The son of Southern Baptist sharecroppers, Cash began playing the guitar and writing songs at age 12. During high school, he performed frequently on radio station KLCN in Blytheville, Arkansas. Cash moved to Detroit in his late teens and worked there until he joined the air force as a radio operator in Germany. He left the air force and married Vivian Liberto in 1954; the couple settled in Memphis, where Cash worked as an appliance salesman and attended radio announcers' school.

With the Tennessee Two — guitarist Luther Perkins and bassist Marshall Grant — he began recording for Sam Phillips' Sun label in 1955. The trio recorded "Cry, Cry, Cry" (Number 14 C&W, 1955), and followed it with "Folsom Prison Blues" (Number Five C&W, 1956). Later in 1956 came Cash's most enduring hit, the million-seller "I Walk the Line" (Number 17, 1956). At Sun, he was also part of an impromptu gospel sing-along with label mates Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis that was widely bootlegged as The Million Dollar Quartet and finally released commercially in 1981 (on the U.K. label Charly).

Cash moved near Ventura, California, in 1958, signed with Columbia, and began a nine-year period of alcohol and drug abuse. He released a number of successful country and pop hits, among them "Ring of Fire" (Number One pop, Number One C&W, 1963), written by June Carter of the Carter Family and Merle Kilgore. By then, he had left his family and moved to New York's Greenwich Village. Late in 1965 Cash was arrested by customs officials for trying to smuggle amphetamines in his guitar case across the Mexican border. He got a suspended sentence and was fined. After a serious auto accident and a near fatal overdose, his wife divorced him. By then Cash had moved to Nashville, where he became friends with Waylon Jennings. Together they spent what both have described as a drug-crazed year and a half.

But in Nashville, Cash began a liaison with June Carter, who helped him get rid of his drug habit by 1967 and reconverted him to fundamentalist Christianity. By the time Cash and Carter married in early 1968, they had been working together regularly. They had hit duets with "Jackson" (Number Two C&W, 1967), "Long-Legged Guitar Pickin' Man" (Number Six C&W, 1967), and versions of Bob Dylan's "It Ain't Me, Babe" (Number 58 pop, Number Four C&W, 1964) and Tim Hardin's "If I Were a Carpenter" (Number 36 pop, Number Two C&W, 1970).

Cash's 1968 live album, At Folsom Prison (Number 13), became a million-seller in 1968. Bob Dylan invited him to sing a duet ("Girl From the North Country") and write liner notes for Nashville Skyline, and Dylan appeared in the first segment of ABC-TV's The Johnny Cash Show in June 1969. The highly rated series, which lasted two years, developed a reputation as an eclectic showcase of contemporary American music, with guests ranging from Louis Armstrong to Carl Perkins to Bob Dylan. Cash had a 1969 hit with Shel Silverstein's "A Boy Named Sue" (Number 2), a track from Johnny Cash at San Quentin; his best-selling album, the live LP was Number One for four weeks.

In 1970 Cash performed at the Nixon White House. He and June Carter traveled to Israel in 1971 to make a documentary, Gospel Road Cash continued to tour and make hits through the '70s, including "A Thing Called Love" (Number Two C&W, 1972) and "One Piece at a Time" (Number One C&W, 1976). He also became active in benefit work, particularly on behalf of prisoners, Native American rights, and evangelist Billy Graham's organization.

In 1982 Cash regrouped with fellow surviving Million Dollar Quartet members Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis to record The Survivors. Three years later Cash hooked up with three other compadres — Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, and Willie Nelson — to form the Highwaymen, releasing Highwayman in 1985. The Highwaymen performed together sporadically throughout the late '80s and '90s, recording Highwayman 2 in 1990 and Highwaymen: The Road Goes On Forever (produced by Don Was) in 1995.

Cash's 25-year relationship with Columbia Records ended in the mid-'80s, and in 1986 he began a somewhat desultory liaison with Nashville's branch of Mercury Records. By the late '80s, his long streak of country hits had ended, and Cash complained to an interviewer that he'd been "purged" from Nashville, replaced by contemporary "hat acts." He continued to perform constantly, however, usually with a package tour that included his wife and her sisters Helen and Anita Carter, as well as Johnny and June's son, John Carter Cash (other Cash and Carter siblings would sometimes show up too). Throughout these years, Cash turned to acting, in a slew of Western-themed movies and TV shows. He also suffered from health problems and underwent heart surgery as well as drug treatment for an addiction to painkillers.

Already a member of the Nashville Songwriter's Hall of Fame (Cash has more than 400 songs to his credit) and the Country Music Hall of Fame, Cash was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. Also that year came the release of the critically acclaimed box set The Essential Johnny Cash. In 1993 he began his return to the forefront with a guest vocal turn on U2's Zooropa; he sang lead vocals on the darkly haunting track "The Wanderer." The following year, Cash was toasted by alt-rock audiences with the release of American Recordings, on the label by the same name, known for its rap and rock artists. Label chief Rick Rubin's production emphasized Cash's brooding, deep vocals, backed by his own simple, but rhythmic acoustic guitar. Featuring, among Cash's own compositions, covers of such artists as Nick Lowe, Leonard Cohen, and Tom Waits, the album's songs veered from Cash's "Redemption" to satanic-rocker Glenn Danzig's "Thirteen." Appearing solo or backed by guitar, bass, and drums, Cash performed in several intimate venues crawling with hipsters. Though the album only reached Number 110 on the pop charts (Number 29 C&W), it received airplay on alternative-rock and college radio stations, garnering critical raves.

In 1996 Cash released another well-received album, Unchained, on which he was backed by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and covered edgy songs by the likes of Beck and Soundgarden. The album won the Best Country Album Grammy, and Cash also garnered a Lifetime Achievement Award Grammy. Then, after experiencing dizziness and tremors in 1997, Cash was diagnosed with the degenerative nervous disorder Shy-Drager syndrome. He retired from the road and began treatments for his illness. In 1999 he was the subject of a televised tribute (featuring Dylan, U2, Springsteen, and others) and made his first public appearance since his diagnosis. In 2000 Cash's health seemed better, and his doctors were beginning to question if they'd made the right diagnosis. Cash released another critically acclaimed album, American III: Solitary Man, which won a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Recording. (It also brought him back to Columbia, which had begun distributing the American label.) In 2002, Cash's American IV: The Man Comes Around continued his commercial success with his rendition of Nine Inch Nails's cover "Hurt." On May 15, 2003, June Carter Cash died while undergoing heart valve replacement surgery. Less than five months later on September 12, Johnny Cash succumbed to respiratory failure due to complications from his long battle with diabetes. The Cash family homestead in Hendersonville, Tennessee would last only four years longer when it was destroyed by fire in April 2007.

from The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll (Simon & Schuster)