Learn to ball a jack. Learn to lay a track. Learn to pick and shovel, too. And take my hammer. - from The Legend of John Henry's Hammer
(This is the third of four Johnny Cash reviews leading up to the release of this "Johnny Cash: The Legend" 4-CD box set on August 2.) Review of DISC 1 - Win, Place And Show - The Hits, here. Review of DISC 2 - here.
DISC 3 - The Legend: American Songbook (26 tracks, 66 minutes)
By Temple A. Stark, Casa Grande, Ariz.
Apparently your American Songbook has a lot to do with trains. Seven of the 26 songs here lie between the iron spikes, cross ties and steel rails: "The Wreck of old 97", "Rock Island Line", "Waiting For a Train", "Casey Jones", "The Legend of John Henry's Hammer", "I've Been Working on the Railroad" and "Wabash Cannonball." Half a dozen more reference trains.
Just like you always wanted to hear Cash narrate "Take Me Out To the Ball Game," this previously unreleased version of "I've Been Working ..." completely satisfies and fits the man perfectly. As does rockabilly, from Cash's first days of learning the guitar while stationed in Germany.
Rockabilly has a natural driving rhythm that recalls the rails and the rolling steel wheels of cargo and commerce railroad cars passing through to the next city. It sounds just like the locomotives pulling away and starting a journey: a slow motion, like it's going to stop. But it doesn't and rolls on. And, as in "A Thing Called Love" it speeds up and pushes on. And, of course, this rhythm is deliberate on "Rock Island Line."
That's fine by me. Last night on Arizona 84 I paralleled a long container train for about 10 miles, slowly gaining. Rain poured, and sheet lightning and strikes both crashed behind the flatbeds.
The windshield wipers in front of me pulled at the same time and had not Neko Case's music been playing I would have rolled down the window, got wet and listened to the Southern Pacific train cross the Casa Grande Valley.
.jpg?t=20120527181101)
Article comments