Search - Johnny Cash :: Columbia Records 1958-1986

Hello, I'm Johnny Heering.

Johnny Heering | Bethel, CT United States | 06/05/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is not quite a "greatest hits" album, but it's a good overview of Johnny Cash's Columbia Records recording career. Many of the songs here, of course, were hits, but there are also a several songs that were not hits, which are just as good as the hits. The CD starts off with the first song Cash recorded for Columbia, the previously unreleased "Oh, What a Dream" (which was later re-recorded as "You Dreamer You", which was released). The CD ends with Johnny's awesome version of Bruce Springsteen's "Highway Patrolman". It between these two songs, you get a bunch of classic hits and interesting album tracks. This is a solid one disc overview of Cash's Columbia years, which any of his fans should enjoy."

Two Of His Better Columbia Albums Rolled Into One

R. Louis Carloni | 08/18/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"When Johnny joined Columbia in 1958, after having had 17 Country and 9 Billboard Pop Top 100 hits for Sun, he would go on to post 33 more Pop hit singles for Columbia and over 120 Country hits, up to and including 1990, a few of them for the Warner and Mercury labels [even Sun would periodically release - and see chart success - selections he had recorded for them and for which they still held licensing rights].



He also had numerous albums released by Columbia, and this CD pulls together two 10-track releases, presenting some of his more memorable performances for that label. These include the hilarious monster hit, A Boy Named Sue, recorded live at San Quentin prison and actually his first effort at the song handed to him just before he left on the trip], the equally-funny One Piece At A Time [about a Detroit auto worker who, over a period of years, smuggled out enough car parts to eventually build his own hybrid], the best versions of The Legend Of John Henry's Hammer and Sunday Morning Coming Down you will ever hear, and the poignant Ballad Of Ira Hayes, about the native Indian who helped raise the flag on Iwo Jima and who died a drunk in a puddle of water.



If there is a flaw it's in the fine print of the liner notes [2 pages] written in 1986 by Marty Stewart. Unless you have the eyes of an owl you will need a magnifying glass to read them. The same applies to the track-by-track discography. The sound quality is, on the other hand, excellent."