(Re-Issue Columbia/Legacy: American Milestones Series 1999) 1968 was a particularly tumultuous year in America, with assassinations, riots, and protests against the war in Vietnam filling the headlines. The year was also an eventful one for Johnny Cash, both personally and professionally. He'd finally kicked his drug problem with the help of June Carter, and married her that year. He recorded a live album at Folsom Prison, and the resulting album became his first bestselling album in 5 years, and his updated version of the album's title track became his first #1 song in 4 years, ushering in, what would become the Man In Black's comeback, putting him at the top of his game. It was also sadly, the year he lost his longtime friend and lead guitarist Luther Perkins in a tragic fire.

At Folsom Prison was a landmark album, a performance in front of an audience of some of the nation's toughest and most hardened criminals. A startling concept back then, and nothing like it had ever been recorded before. Johnny had performed at various prisons before, as he felt a special kinship with those behind the walls due to his own scrapes with the law in his past. He felt if he could bring even just a few hours of brightness into the lives of those living in hopelessness, it was well worth his time.

The original 1968 LP release of At Folsom Prison wasn't the entire show, and was edited for both length and language. The album was later re-issued on CD, both in it's original release form, and also on a release coupled with his San Quentin show. However, this 1999 Columbia/Legacy release has restored the concert to it's full unedited length, adding the 3 songs that were left off the original version, and includes it's original uncensored language which was edited out of the original release. Also included is a booklet with notes written in Johnny's own hand and words on why he chose to perform at prisons, and also includes his 1999 statements in the liner notes, about how pleased he was that the entire concert was restored, as he felt the songs that were left off the original were as good and just as deserving of being heard as those that appeared in the edited version.

Joining Johnny for this show are his band, The Tennessee Three, the The Statler Brothers, The Carter Family and June Carter Cash. At Folsom Prison doesn't contain Johnny's big hits, but he rather chose just about every 'prison' song he could think of, as well as songs he felt the inmates would most relate to. The element that really makes this album work though, is the rapport, perhaps you could even call it a bond, that Johnny has with his audience. Even on the songs with the most violent lyrics, such as "Folsom Prison Blues," "Cocaine Blues," or even the tongue-in-cheek tale of execution, "25 Minutes To Go," Johnny delivers them with a sort of laid back gallows humor, joking throughout and between many of them. His unflinching, matter-of-fact approach is what connects him to his audience, a 'knowing' and sympathetic figure, who presents himself as their equal and not a judge of the deeds that put them there.

Most of the songs revolve around prison life, the deeds both intentional and unintentional of winding up behind bars, ("Folsom Prison," "Cocaine Blues," "The Long Black Veil"), the long and lonely hours spent longing for freedom ("The Wall," "Green, Green Grass Of Home," "Orange Blossom Special"), resignation to prison life ("Dark As The Dungeon," "25 Minutes To Go," "I've Got Stripes"), and missing loved ones never to be seen again ("I Still Miss Someone," "Send A Picture Of Mother," "Give My Love To Rose). Johnny breaks things up with some comic relief by way of his outrageously goofy tale of being kissed off with "Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart," and the truly warped humor of "Dirty Old Egg Suckin' Dog." He brings out June for a show stopping rendition of their duet, "Jackson." He poignantly closes out the show with a song written by a Folsom inmate, Glen Sherley, titled "Greystone Chapel," a song of finding personal redemption from God, and ultimately peace with himself despite his circumstances.

The 3 songs restored to the album are "Joe Bean," the tale of a young man being executed on his 20th birthday for a murder he didn't commit, with the proof of his innocence being the song's ironic twist, a 7 minute version of "The Legend Of John Henry's Hammer," a request taken from the audience, and a cover of Harlan Howard's "Busted." Johnny was right in saying that all three are just as good and worthy of hearing, as everything else that appeared on the original release.

While the violent and depressing images of many of the songs' lyrics, the inmates' cheering responses to the most violent of them, the various announcements by prison officers, and the booing of the prison officials, might seem to make for a cruel, morbid and uncomfortable listening experience, it doesn't turn out that way. Instead we get classic Johnny Cash in his prime, and at the same time, his easiness and humor with his audience shows a man of great compassion and humility. With the demeanor in which he performs, he could've just as easily been playing before a church group, as an audience of hardened criminals. And with At Folsom Prison, Johnny gives us the best of both sides of himself, his great music and a great insight into what makes the legendary Man In Black tick, making this recording an essential.