"They say there's no place like home," Johnny Cash wistfully states in his introduction to "There's a Mother Always Waiting at Home." "When I was young, I didn't know there was any other place but home."
This statement encapsulates the feel of the
country-music legend's latest posthumous release, Personal File (Sony). A collection of 49 previously unreleased tracks on two discs, the album is unabashedly, unsettlingly intimate as if the listener had been transported directly into the Cash-family living room.
According to the record's accompanying material, the album brings together a series of private recordings made by Cash at his home studio mostly in 1973, with a few additions in 1982. Discovered in a private vault, the master tapes were kept in a box labeled simply, "Personal File," and never intended for release.
Understandably, these are not your typical Cash standards. Listeners will not find alternate takes of classics like "Ring of Fire," or more brutally fragile interpretations of alt-rock songs like the recent Nine Inch Nails cover, "Hurt." Instead, connoisseurs will delight in Cash's renditions of songs he learned as a child, his favorite hymns, and obscure original compositions.
The laidback familiarity of these recordings raises several significant issues. On one hand, this album is a gut-wrenching testament to an extraordinary musician. Cash's voice is at the height of its power, slow-burning and mournful, resonating over guitar strumming so unobtrusive it almost disappears.
The Irish classic "Galway Bay" and the devastating ode to a family's dying patriarch, "I Wanted So," reaffirm that there has never been a singer more adroit at capturing the hope and pain of human longing.
Conversely, the sheer proximity of these recordings can also be suffocating. The first disc, comprised of secular material, offers some slight variance in tempo, theme, and style. Unfortunately, the second, reverb-drenched CD, made up exclusively of religious tracks and spirituals, quickly becomes tedious. In this context, Cash's introductions lose much of their earlier quaintness as they take on a distinctly sermon-like quality.
In the end, Personal File is definitely not for neophytes. For those enthralled by the man and the myth, this album offers the appealing, down-home intimacy of a front-porch sing-along. For the majority of people, though, these recordings will seem invasive and voyeuristic, leaving them feeling like a stalker hiding behind the bushes.
Related Articles:
Join the Folk Music Section's weekly newsletter by sending an email to folkmusic@suite101.com.
