Johnny Cash - Songwriter

Songwriter is a lost Johnny Cash album brought back to life from 1993 recordings, pressed here on 180 gram vinyl.

Early that year, between record deals and shortly before he met Rick Rubin, Cash cut a set of his own songs at LSI Studios in Nashville. The tapes were shelved once the American Recordings era began, until his son John Carter Cash and longtime engineer David "Fergie" Ferguson stripped them back to Cash's voice and guitar and built fresh arrangements around them. Marty Stuart, a former member of Cash's touring band, plays across much of the record, giving it an authentic, lived-in feel.

The result sounds warm and unforced. "Hello Out There" opens the record with an easy, rolling gait, and "Spotlight" picks up a gritty swagger thanks to Dan Auerbach's guitar. "Drive On" will be familiar from its later American Recordings version, heard here in a fuller, country-band setting, while "Poor Valley Girl" turns tender with Vince Gill adding harmony.

Throughout, Cash sounds relaxed and in command, a storyteller with plenty left to say, his baritone as steady and unmistakable as ever.

Released in 2024, it was a welcome surprise for longtime fans, and a reminder that his catalogue still had treasures waiting in the vault.