"Long Black Veil" is another simple three-minute story gem. Cash's character, in the song, wonders from beyond the grave, if his life is worth remembering:
She walks these hills in a long black veil. She visits my grave when the night winds wail. Nobody knows, nobody sees. nobody knows but me."
The first "nobody" there is a perfect example of Cash's simple but effective vocal tricks, playing off the words. Following "wail" "nobody knows" is stretched out over several beats.
Shel Silverstein's "25 Minutes To Go" is a chilling tale of the last moments of a death row inmate's life; Cash infuses it with the tattered-vocals desperation (but still anger) that must exist at that time. Even from the guilty.
"Well, they gave me some beans for my last meal. I got 23 minutes to go. But nooooooobody asked me how I feel. I got 22 minutes to go. ... And the trap and the rope aw they work just fine. Got 10 more minutes to go. I'm waiting for the pardon that'll set me free with 9 more minutes to go. But this is for real, so forget about me. Got 8 more minutes to go. .... Won't someone come and cut me loose? Got 4 more minutes to go ... ... And now I'm swinging and here I go oh woah woah oh. ... "
(Former Playboy cartoonist Silverstein is the writer behind "The Boy Named Sue" hit as well as "On the Cover of the Rolling Stone" (Dr. Hook And The Medicine Show) and Tori Amos' "Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout Would not Take the Garbage Out.")
"25 Minutes To Go" is hard to listen to, too often, because you though you should start to feel real happy thinking of the revenge for the poor victim the man killed to get him killed, you never get there.
On cue, we get "Cocaine Blues," again at Folsom Prison, which puts Cash in a role a little too empathetic and unrepentant for comfort. But it rocks, as he growls of the fictional murder he didn't think twice about, while drowning in a cocaine lifestyle:
... In about five minutes in walked the man
Holding the verdict in his right hand
The verdict read murder in the first degree
I hollered Lawdy Lawdy, have a mercy on meThe judge he smiled as he picked up his pen
99 years in the Folsom pen
99 years underneath that ground
I can't forget the day I shot that bad bitch down
Article comments
1 - Temple Stark
Shit I think I just described why I like music and books so much better than films.
2 - Aaron, Duke De Mondo
wonderful, Temple, wonderful. i so need to get this set. And a slight word of defence with regards "Walk The Line" - the trailer looks great, an also, it was intended to be released in Johnny's lifetime. a lot of the script is from talks the director had with the man himself regarding the project. but i agree, i'd much rather have a wonderful cinema re-release of the brilliant docuementary, the name of which i always mess up. The Man, His World, His Life, His Music, i think. that is a wonderful film right there. Johnny singin songs he's just written to June, those prison shows, my god. what more do we need?
3 - Aaron, Duke De Mondo
an man, that Mariah spam amused me no end. "broken worldwide records everywhere", indeed!
4 - Bryan McKay
I would like to break her records everywhere worldwide. That would solve lots of things.