Johnny Cash -- Sun albums

As I showed in previous posts about Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, discographies from the 1950s were in complete disarray, especially when it came to albums. Back then, singles were king, and albums were seen as simply a way to earn extra money from the most devoted fans. Johnny Cash’s album discography was no different.

Making it a bit more difficult to reorganize is that overdubs were sometimes done on some of Cash’s songs at much later dates than the initial recordings. So do you place the song in the timeline of when it was originally recorded or when it received overdubs?

In the end, I used the Time-Life Johnny Cash box set, The Complete Sun Recordings, 1955-58, as a guide, which is somewhat surprisingly thorough. It doesn’t have a bunch of alternate takes or demos, just the masters, and they’re in fairly good chronological order. Going by this, Johnny should have had five albums of 12 tracks or more while at Sun Records. But the label mixed and matched various tracks and often repeatedly rereleased the biggest hits.

So here we try to remedy the situation with what could have been.

Johnny Cash

SIDE A

1. Folsom Prison Blues

2. Wide Open Road

3. Hey Porter

4. Cry! Cry! Cry!

5. My Two Timin’ Woman

6. Port of Lonely Hearts

SIDE B

1. So Doggone Lonesome

2. I Couldn’t Keep from Crying

3. Trail to Mexico

4. Mean Eyed Cat

5. Luther Played the Boogie

6. Get Rhythm

Johnny didn't release his first album at Sun until October 1957. In fact, it was Sun's first-ever album. But the label could have if it had the resources and wherewithal, released Johnny's debut album in mid-1956. And the album could have looked like this. Johnny Cash leads off with his big hit "Folsom Prison Blues" and also contains several other of his classics, such as "Hey Porter," "Cry! Cry! Cry!," "Mean Eyed Cat" and "Get Rhythm" (which concludes the album). For a cover, I used the one Sun used for the album Johnny Cash Sings the Songs That Made Him Famous and altered it a bit.

Johnny Cash with the Tennessee Two

SIDE A

1. You’re My Baby (Little Woolly Booger)

2. There You Go

3. I Walk the Line

4. Don’t Make Me Go

5. I Love You Because

6. Train of Love

SIDE B

1. Goodbye Little Darlin’

2. Next in Line

3. My Treasure

4. Straight A’s in Love

5. Home of the Blues

6. Give My Love to Rose

The title of this album gives some overdue credit to Johnny's backups, Luther Perkins and Marshall Grant (the Tennessee Two). The giant hit "I Walk the Line" would have propelled this album. The last batch of these tracks was recorded in the summer of 1957, which means this could have been a late 1957 release, possibly in time for the holiday shopping season. :) I found this cover of yet another compilation and altered it a bit

Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar

SIDE A

1. Rock Island Line

2. I Heard That Lonesome Whistle Blow

3. Country Boy

4. If the Good Lord’s Willing

5. Goodnight Irene

6. Remember Me (I’m the One Who Loves You)

SIDE B

1. Belshazzar

2. I Was There When It Happened

3. Big River

4. Wreck of the Old ‘97

5. Ballad of a Teenage Queen

6. Doin’ My Time

Johnny Cash with His Hot and Blue Guitar was the actual first of Johnny's Sun albums. This version shares eight songs with the original, including the first four tracks. "Ballad of a Teenage Queen" was completed in late 1957, which would allow this album to probably come out in early 1958. 

Now Here’s Johnny Cash

SIDE A

1. Sugartime

2. Come in Stranger

3. Life Goes On

4. Born to Lose

5. Leave that Junk Alone

6. You Win Again

SIDE B

1. Oh, Lonesome Me

2. Always Alone

3. You’re the Nearest Thing to Heaven

4. The Story of a Broken Heart

5. You Tell Me

6. Guess Things Happen that Way

"You Win Again" was the last of these tracks recorded during a session in May 1958 when Johnny also recorded several Hank Williams songs (that we use for the next album). Therefore, we can see Now Here's Johnny Cash coming out that summer, and would have been the last Sun album released before Johnny left the label. For the cover, one of many Sun compilations that I took and changed around.

Johnny Cash Sings Hank Williams

SIDE A

1. I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still in Love with You)

2. Hey, Good Lookin’

3. I Could Never Be Ashamed of You

4. Cold, Cold Heart

5. I Forgot to Remember to Forget

6. I Just Thought You’d Like to Know

SIDE B

1. The Ways of a Woman in Love

2. Blue Train

3. Katy Too

4. Fools Hall of Fame

5. It’s Just About Time

6. Down the Street to 301

7. Thanks a Lot

Perhaps knowing that he was leaving Sun and preferring to save his own songs for his Columbia debut, Johnny recorded several Hank Williams songs. Sun released Johnny Cash Sings Hank Williams in 1960, but theoretically could have issued it the year before. Perhaps the strangest thing about the released album is that it didn't originally include "Cold, Cold Heart." My version does. In fact, my version only includes three songs that were on the actual album as Sun decided to paste in old hits. I used the original cover. It's kind of an odd one. Since Johnny had left the label, I guess they just had some guy hold a guitar and face away from the camera to mimic him.

Greatest!

SIDE A

1. Cry! Cry! Cry!

2. Folsom Prison Blues

3. So Doggone Lonesome

4. Mean Eyed Cat

5. Luther Played the Boogie

6. Get Rhythm

7. I Walk the Line

SIDE B

1. There You Go

2. Train of Love

3. I Love You Because

4. Goodbye Little Darlin’

5. Straight A’s in Love

6. Next in Line

I debated whether to include this or not, but ultimately decided to do so because Sun got it so wrong. The title implies that it's a greatest hits collection, but that's not what was on the actual album. So, I fixed that, as these are all hits. I took the original cover, changed the list of songs, and added the Sun logo, which was suspiciously missing.

Greatest Hits, Volume 2

SIDE A

1. Guess Things Happen That Way

2. Give My Love to Rose

3. Home of the Blues

4. Rock Island Line

5. Big River

6. Come in Stranger

7. Ballad of a Teenage Queen 

SIDE B

1. The Ways of a Woman in Love

2. Oh, Lonesome Me

3. You’re the Nearest Thing to Heaven

4. Katy Too

5. Thanks a Lot 

6. It’s Just About Time

And if we're going to include one batch of hits, we might as well have a second volume with the remainder of the hits. Again, I used an existing compilation cover and altered the graphics.

So here are five full albums that Sun could have issued without repeated tracks, plus two best-of compilations. You have to wonder what record companies were thinking back then, but perhaps not much thought was put into albums at all.


Note: Thanks not only to the Time-Life box set but also to the Johnny Cash: The Sun Sessionography, 1954-1964 website: http://www.meaneyedcat.net/johnny_cash_at_sun.html