10 Questions with The Man in BlackApril 1, 2003
There's not a whole lot 71-year old country legend Johnny Cash hasn't achieved in his 46 year career as a recording musician. He's recorded more than 1,500 songs - 48 of them which have even crossed over into Billboard's Top 100 Pop charts. He's not only garnered 11 Grammy awards, but has also taken home just about every other conceivable music achievement award known to man; songwriting, video, and lifetime achievement awards, just to mention a few. He was the youngest inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame and, other than Elvis Presley who later followed him, is the only person that has ever been inducted into both the Country and Rock Music Hall of Fames.
Considering that his health has been spiraling downward over the past few years - including a couple of near death experiences - Cash has surprisingly, however, continued to turn out a prolific amount of material throughout the last decade. What's even more surprising is that with all of this later material, subtitled American Recordings and entirely produced under the guidance of Rick Rubin (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Beastie Boys and Slayer, among others), Cash has created a four volume set of honest, stripped-down, harrowing music that rivals even his best work from the late '50s and early '60s.
Despite Nashville and the country music industry ignorantly turning their back on this powerful material and Cash's own musical legacy, not only has The Man in Black retained many of his longtime fans, but with the help of Rubins, as well as his recent video of Trent Reznor's song "Hurt" (arguably the most moving music video of all time) he's also quickly gaining acceptance from a brand new audience - the young and hip.
Livewire is proud to present Johnny Cash speaking candidly and with great passion about his latest accomplishment, American IV: The Man Comes Around.
