Predictable it may be to note, but Johnny Cash was one of the coolest musicians around. His music proved this just as much as his image. There are two sides to Cash as a songwriter, and the road from raging country troublemaker to tender, reflective legend is not without potholes. Blues, country, a raging storm of instrumental indifference to the problems of the past, Cash is the man to set a new course through established genres. He does so brilliantly on his debut album, Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar!, a mesmerising country experience which is a must-listen, but not for its historic merit. This may be the album that started it all for Cash, but it still offers a keen brilliance away from hit singles. Folsom Prison Blues and I Walk the Line may be the definitive album pieces here, but there is much to love about those A-side delights and B-side deep cuts.
Opening song Rock Island Line picking up steam and speed, as Cash calls it, with an increase to the tempo, is smart work. A brilliant example of his instrumental strength but also his vocal brilliance. Trail song brilliance from Cash on a blistering two-minute opener. He shows off not what the genre can be pushed into doing but what he can deliver with the right songs. I Heard That Lonesome Whistle establishes he can do the classics well, the sort of music you expect to hear when Jimmy Stewart or Henry Fonda staggers into some Hollywood saloon. Cash’s ability to play up the expectations of the genre is just as important as his innovations. Magnificent songs like Cry, Cry, Cry and Remember Me highlight that slow drawl, the staggering vocal quality of Cash as a performer. This is his chance to cement himself as one of the all-time greats and he does it so easily on Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar!.
Songs of love and hate are what Cash details. Often there’s an overlap at play which brings out the best in his songwriting. So Doggone Lonesome is a thrill of a listen. A lover’s lament where the protagonist does not hope to reconnect with someone, but instead mourns their loss and curses themselves for that departure. Classics like I Walk the Line and Folsom Prison Blues are still staggering. Live versions may be much superior to these studio recordings but the welcome, slower tempo of these recordings gives the songs a paranoia which Cash would make good on in the years to follow. In sweat-inducing performances of keeping his eye on the line he walks, on being the man on the run from Reno, he built a character and as such, evolved the songs. Few artists can do that, fewer still confident enough to do so. Magnificent work like that is a given for Cash, who decades later, in a career lull, could still innovate.
Tremendous covers of the classics like Hank Williams and Jimmie Skinner are found within this debut album, but it’s the originals which stand out best of all. Cry, Cry, Cry, Folsom Prison Blues, and So Doggone Lonesome are real thrills. I Walk the Line is the best of the bunch, sandwiched between a Jimmie Davis cover and a traditional arranged by Cash. It showcases not just his abilities as a performer but as an instrumentalist, the latter showcased brilliantly with his acoustic guitar work but also with an ear for bringing traditional to life. You can hear it on Rock Island Line, too, a song without writing credit, but one which Cash embodies so brilliantly. Confidence is crucial to these early country efforts and Cash has plenty of it to give. He would continue giving it long after Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar!, but this is an amazing starting point for the veteran songwriter.
