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Johnny Cash: The Last Great American

Documentary profiling the life of the legendary country music star Johnny Cash, who died in 2003, featuring contributions from his family and fellow musicians.

Documentary profiling the life of legendary country music star Johnny Cash, who died in 2003 shortly after completing the retrospective Unearthed, a five-CD set of the acoustic performances with which he resurrected his career in the last decade of his life, and after losing his wife, June Carter Cash.

This first major retrospective of Cash's life, times and music features contributions from his daughter Rosanne Cash and son John Carter Cash, his longtime manager Lou Robin and fellow musicians including Little Richard, Cowboy Jack Clement, Kris Kristofferson, Merle Haggard and Elvis Costello.

Cash was the son of a poor sharecropper from Kingsland, Arkansas, who sang folk, spiritual and country songs to himself while picking cotton in the fields. In the 50s he signed to Sam Phillips' Sun Records, scored his first hits and was part of the 'Million Dollar Quartet' with Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins.

In the 60s, he created his famous 'Man in Black' persona, and became a huge country star with hits like Folsom Prison Blues, Ring of Fire, I Walk the Line and A Boy Named Sue, while torn between drug dependency, hellraising and a powerful spirituality. Cash had long since established himself as a man of the people with his prison concerts beginning with an incendiary performance at San Quentin in 1958.

He ended the decade by finally marrying June Carter - a member of hugely influential US country dynasty the Carter Family - launching his own national TV series from Nashville, befriending the Native American movement and opposing the war in Vietnam while playing concerts for the soldiers in the field.

After tough times in the 80s, Cash reignited his career with a new young audience in the 90s when he recorded with rap-rock producer Rick Rubin.

1 hour

Last on

Sat 28 Nov 2009 00:30
Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Four

Music Played

  • Johnny Cash

    Get Rhythm

  • The Carter Family

    The East Virginia Blues

  • The Carter Family

    March Winds Goin' To Blow My Blues All Away

  • Hank Williams

    I Saw The Light

  • John Lee Hooker & Miles Davis

    Bank Robbery

  • Johnny Cash & The Tennessee Two - Cry, Cry, Cry

  • Johnny Cash

    I Walk The Line

  • Elvis Presley - Heartbreak Hotel

  • Johnny Cash

    Heartbreak Hotel

    (Originally performed by Elvis Presley)

  • Angelo Badalamenti

    Lauren's Walking

  • Johnny Cash & The Tennessee Two - Folsom Prison Blues

  • Red House Painters

    Brockwell Park

  • Stephen Stills

    Go Back Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

  • Johnny Cash

    Busted

  • Johnny Cash & The Tennessee Two - Big River

  • Mazzy Star

    Into Dust

  • Johnny Cash

    Ring Of Fire

  • Johnny Cash

    The Ballad of Ira Hayes

  • The Durutti Column

    For Colette

  • Stephen Stills

    Go Back Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

  • Red House Painters

    Moments

  • The Durutti Column

    My Irascible Friend

  • Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash - Jackson

  • Cowboy Junkies

    To Love Is To Bury

  • The Byrds

    Wasn't Born To Follow

  • Johnny Cash

    San Quentin I Hate You

  • Cowboy Junkies

    Dreaming My Dreams Of You

  • Bob Dylan & Johnny Cash - Girl From The North Country

  • Cowboy Junkies

    To Love Is To Bury

  • Johnny Cash

    Tha Man In Black

  • Red House Painters

    Moments

  • The Smashing Pumpkins

    Starla

  • The Highwaymen

    Highwayman

  • Public Enemy - Fight The Power

  • Johnny Cash

    Delia's Gone

  • Johnny Cash

    Personal Jesus

    (Originally performed by Depeche Mode)

  • Johnny Cash

    The Beast In Me

    (Originally performed by Nick Lowe)

  • Johnny Cash & The Tennessee Two - Folsom Prison Blues

  • Johnny Cash

    Ring Of Fire

  • Public Enemy - Do You Wanna Go Our Way

  • Cowboy Junkies

    Something More Beside You

  • Miles Davis / Bradford Ellis

    Gloria's Story

  • Johnny Cash

    Hurt

    (Originally performed by Nine Inch Nails)

  • Mazzy Star

    Into Dust

  • Johnny Cash

    If I Give My Soul

Credit

Director Chris Rodley

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