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Johnny Cash | American IV: The Man Comes Around

The Man in Black at his loneliest.
CD, Lost Highway/Universal

Tekst: Maurice Dielemans

Publicatiedatum: 11 november 2002

Cash’ first CD released on the Lost Highway record label is the fourth collaboration with producer Rick Rubin. American IV: The Man Comes Around is a typically fine collection from the Man in Black. But while its frightening songs of love, god and murder are superior and stand out among most of today’s contemporary country music and anything else, The Man Comes Around is definitely not Cash’ best and sometimes a little uneven, due to both the below-average selection of songs (including songs of Sting, Depeche Mode, The Beatles, Don Henley and Nine Inch Nails) and Johnny Cash’ weak voice, though the fragility and emotional strength of his baritone are also the charms of this American recording.

Sounding very vulnerable on The Man Comes Around, Johnny Cash is a true survivor. He sounds more depressing and haunting than on any of the previous American Recordings releases. The Man Comes Around finds Johnny Cash at his very loneliest and with the bitter tears in his pale blue eyes, but there are some unlucky moments where the intensity is roughly interrupted. On Cash’ adoption of the Simon & Garfunkel standard ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’, Fiona Apple’s misplaced backing vocals sound lost and doesn’t seem to fit quite well here, which is also exactly the same problem with the Hank Williams original ‘I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry’ as a duet with Nick Cave. For example, the same formula did work for Johnny Cash and Bonnie Prince Billy’s ‘I See A Darkness’ on American Recordings III: Solitary Man.

The Irish traditional ‘Danny Boy’, the preaching of ‘Hurt’, the Don Henley-penned ‘Desperado’ and Depeche Mode’s spiritual ‘Personal Jesus’ certainly prove that the Man in Black remains a real outlaw and that he doesn’t necessarily needs a helping hand. Cash also does an excellent job with Sting’s ‘I Hung My Head’ and several of his own compositions that have been written for this new collection, such as the title track that starts off the album. Unfortunately, Cash’ recycled version of ‘Sam Hall’ doesn’t add anything new to the original on Ballads of the True West, but our Man in Black couldn’t have selected a better song than We’ll Meet Again to conclude this collection.

Considering the minimal production and that Johnny Cash’ voice has lost much of its power, this uneven album still shows that Johnny Cash is a living legend. Though the Man Comes Around is also more scattered than American Recordings, Unchained and Solitary Man, American IV: The Man Comes Around is still another masterpiece of utterly honest beauty and raw emotion in the series of American Recordings.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/johnny-cash/american-iv-the-man-comes-around/2034/
Meer Johnny Cash op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/johnny-cash