Johnny Cash – Now, There Was A Song!

It’s a well known fact that Johnny Cash played a lot of covers. In fact, some folks not as hip to him would jab that he barely wrote any music at all. He wrote a lot of music, to be sure, but when your discography reaches over 100 albums, it’s a given that not all of the songs on every album is going to be an original. One thing that everyone can agree on, however, is that when Johnny Cash did covers, there wasn’t a thing about them that even hinted at the idea that the song wasn’t written just for him. Now, There Was A Song! is the first album purely made up of covers, and the title isn’t lying, these are some pretty dadgum good songs:

This album features the first instance of a cover that Johnny would record over 40 years later, and it’s one of my favorites of his “American” catalogue, a cover of Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”. The version on Now, There Was A Song! does not feature popular singer Nick Cave however, as he was only 3 years old at the time.

The album starts with a song by George Jones (and Darrell Edwards) called “Seasons Of My Heart”.  It’s what I would consider a “rather clever Country song”, and really if I were more of a George Jones fan I could tell you about his version, but I’m not, so I can’t. This song, like most of the others on this album, mysteriously contain a large amount of pedal steel and fiddle, two instruments not found too often in Johnny Cash’s albums. Still, they’re low-key enough to not sound like honky tonk trash, otherwise I would be quietly ignoring this album. The lap steel kind of has that “Hawaiian” effect going for it, and I can dig that at least.

“I Feel Better All Over” is the next track, and it has a great second part to that line: “I feel better all over more than anywhere else”. Not bad, but the rest of the song is kind of so-so, but hey! Did you know it was written by Kenny Rogers? Did you know Kenny Rogers was writing songs before 1960? It might be because he’s fat, but I could have sworn he was younger than that. Another interesting thing about this song is that Johnny hits some uncharacteristically high notes, not as high as the first song he recorded, of course, but that was more of a fluke than anything.

The next song was written by Marty Robbins, a man Johnny admired quite a lot (at least he gave him a very flattering tribute in the latter of his autobiographies). It’s called “I Couldn’t Keep From Crying”, and actually was first recorded by Cash fairly early on when he was at Sun Recordings, though it never surfaced on any albums until this past decade or so, as I understand. It’s a good song, and certainly the Columbia version is better than the first recording as far as I can tell.

Next we have “Time Changes Everything” which was written by Tommy Duncan, who sang for the original Western Swing band Bob Wills And The Texas Playboys (a band my great-granddad turned down an offer to play drums for, incidentally).  It’s a rather refreshing anti-love song, as it goes, because it defies all the other broken heart songs by declaring quite logically that he doesn’t love the girl in question anymore because “Time Changes Everything”. The sentiment would not carry over to any of the other songs, however.

For instance, “My Shoes Keep Walking Walking Back To You”, is another love-lost song (really though what Country song isn’t?) at nearly the breaking point to “obsequious”. Actually this song was part-written by Bob Wills, so the inconsistency in messages is at least inconsistent at its source! Both songs are mighty catchy too, just to let you know.

Ahh, now we’re about half-way through the album, and I think the second half is far better. First off is “I’d Just Be Fool Enough (To Fall)”, a self-deprecating unrequited love song that has a great line:

Oh please don’t be so careless with your glances
Don’t look at me that way and breathe a sigh
Please don’t get too close and let me love you
Cause I just might be fool enough to try

As a dude who is a self-confessed “hopeless case” with the ladies, I can identify with this a little more than somewhat. However, I’m not a coked-out fiend, so I don’t identify well with the next song, except to say I love it.

That song, of course, is “Transfusion Blues” which you may know by its proper title “Cocaine Blues” when it was sung on At Folsom Prison and waaaaaay later on Mystery Of Life. Why the title had to be changed from “Cocaine” to “Transfusion” is beyond me, when the whole story of shooting your woman and running from the law and being sentenced to life in prison is all still intact and, in my opinion, much more severe. I can understand the final line, “I can’t forget the day I shot that bad bitch down” being changed to substitute “bad bitch” for “woman”. I guess cocaine wouldn’t be fashionable until 20 years later, so it was a bit taboo back then. Either way, this song is fantastic, and the awkward substitution doesn’t take away from it THAT much.

Next we have yet another song to stack on the pile of evidence that all women are evil, “Why Do You Punish Me (For Loving You)?”, a tune by Erwin King. It’s one of the more clever ones, however, as the chorus is thus:

My heart cries out behind these prison bars
It pleads to you for your true love to set it free
Why do you punish me, is love a crime?
If so, I’ll spend a lifetime loving serving time

Not too bad, suspiciously close to a song I wrote long before ever hearing this song… whoops!

A much more concret song is “I Will Miss You When You Go”, which almost needs no explanation, as it’s so effective and simple it’s almost not even a song. This, however, is a facet of Country music that can not be denied. It’s not really a genre where a lot of imagination is required, but God bless it anyway.

Which is not to say there aren’t imaginative people in Country music, I don’t really care who you are, Hank Williams will always be one of the top if not the top Country songwriters (in fact, the only person to topple him from the top of the “Greatest Country Artists Of All Time” list is Johnny Cash). Despite his short life, he wrote well over 200 songs, nearly all of which are expertly crafted given the 3 chords he was given. Quite possibly my favorite of these songs is “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”, which sounds like your typical Country fare, but in fact the lyrics paint an indellible picture of country landscapes and birds and a starry sky to illustrate the twisted reality of a broken heart. Brilliant stuff, if you have an open mind to it. Of course, the quintessential version of the song is the one Johnny would record on one of his final albums with Nick Cave, but we’ll get to that when it comes.

The next song is one of my favorites on this album, too. It’s another George Jones tuned called “Just One More”, which is (rather late in the album) a song about drinkin’ your woes away. Of course, I don’t drink, so I can’t say I personally relate to the song, but then again I do:

Put the bottle on the table let it stay there till I’m not able
To see your face in every place that I go
I’ve been sitting here so long, just remembering that you are gone
One more drink of wine
And if you’re still on my mind
One drink
Just one more
And then another

The adding of more and more drinks to the chorus is, in a simple way, very clever indeed. It’s hard to picture Johnny Cash getting drunk on wine, as that was never really his style, but he sings it believably enough, as that is how he sings songs, if you weren’t aware.

Finally, we’ve got the unlikely song “Honky-Tonk Girl”, which is kind of a novelty song about a certain kind of girl… one that breaks hearts… and hangs out in Honky-Tonks. Ok, so not EVERY song is a winner (though it’s performed well enough for sure). Maybe it’s just my inability to understand Honky-Tonk culture that well. Oh well!

So that’s Now, There Was A Song!, it’s actually a rather short album at only 26 minutes, in fact I listened to the entire thing on the way to work and again during my lunch-break, with one more play of “Seasons Of My Heart”. So yes, if you are looking for a quick and cheap ($12.99 for the re-issue that came out this month that includes 2 other full length albums!) Johnny Cash album and aren’t particularly fond of songs he has written, then this is perfect for you!