Bulletins

Exclusively from the Sony Music Entertainment Photo Archives, ICON Collectibles has just rolled out some fantastic new Johnny Cash prints for the summer! To celebrate these exciting new pieces of music history, ICON is offering Cash fans a 20% discount on all Johnny Cash framed and unframed fine art prints (including limited editions) when fans use promo code ICON6PAK at checkout. Offer ends July 31st. Check out the new prints now at the ICON website:

http://www.icon-collectibles.com/category/17785104441/1/Johnny-Cash.htm

ATTENTION ALL MARYLAND AREA FANS - In honor of Johnny Cash's birthday, Legacy Recordings and the American Film Institute will hold a special screening of the Northern Light Production Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison on February 26, 2009 at 7pm. February 26, 2009 marks the 77th birthday of this American icon.

AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center
8633 Colesville Rd.
Silver Spring, MD 20910

Listen to Johnny Cash talk radio shows every Wednesday with host Bill Miller exclusively on JohnnyCash.com!

Johnny Cash's America was not red, white, or blue, but black. And that blackness contained multitudes. While society has become increasingly divided, Cash navigated some of the most contentious issue of our time - war, prison, reform, youth discontent, religion, Native American rights - without losing his audience. Americans who can agree on little else have agreed on Johnny Cash. What lessons can be learned from his story?

Johnny Cash's America blends biography, essay, and music to explore the meaning of one American's life. The film, which will be seen on A&E's Biography starting end of October (just in time for the election), chapters Cash's life, his agricultural roots, finding his voice within the original rock and rollers, his commitment to family and self education, his anger at the treatment of Native Americans, his refusal to let prisoners be forgotten, America's wars - his support and resistance, and patriotism even when questioning the government. All things that are relevant today.

Appearing in the film, besides Johnny Cash himself, are Bob Dylan, Al Gore, Snoop Dog, Sheryl Crow, Kris Kristofferson, Sen. Lamar Alexander, Tim Robbins, and many more.

Johnny Cash's America will be available everywhere October 28, or pre-order through Amazon now!

See the full "I Am The Nation" video on YouTube

Johnny Cash fans can now add the official Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison Splashcast widget to their blogs, website, or social network pages.  Splashcast can also be used as a Facebook application.  Just visit the link below to grab your official Johnny Cash widget:

http://web.splashcast.net/web_watch/?code=QWJJ6726FR

A never before released spoken word track was recently uncovered from the vault of Johnny Cash called "I Am The Nation". This recording of I Am The Nation will be released on the Johnny Cash America documentary DVD/CD released by Legacy Recordings on October 28th. The film Johnny Cash's America is poignantly placed in the context of today's political climate and this oration "I Am The Nation" reminds us what our country stands for at a time when Americans seem more divided than ever.

Johnny Cash's America examines how Johnny became the most authentic celebrity voice our country had. He embraced all of America's diversity without prejudice or partisanship and he had so much clout with the American people that every President in office during his lifetime courted Johnny Cash. Both the right and the left claimed him, although he remained non partisan. He was championed by teenage punks, their parents, and their grandparents. He was embraced by soldiers and anarchists, by conservatives and liberals, yuppies and rednecks. When times demanded change, he was not afraid to change with them. When times were good, he sang in celebration.

Untainted by partisanship and spin, Cash STILL remains a rare bridge in our culture.

On January 13, 1968, Johnny Cash walked into California's Folsom State Prison and made popular music history. The choicest cuts from the two shows he recorded that day merged to become At Folsom Prison, a multi-million selling album produced by Bob Johnston that unveiled a startling portrait of American prison life and energized Cash's career. The most popular album of Cash's career to that point, it soared to the top of the charts and paved Cash's way to international stardom.

Now available in this deluxe three-disc edition are each one of Cash's thirty-six performances from both shows (sixteen of them unissued until now) and the unreleased performances of his road mates Carl Perkins, The Statler Brothers, and June Carter. The definitive versions of Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues," "Cocaine Blues," "Dark As A Dungeon" and other classics crack from the album like shotgun fire, cementing his mythic man-in-black persona and underscoring his rowdy camaraderie with the imprisoned men. Cash also takes on songs new to him such as the country chestnut "I'm Just Here to Get My Baby Out of Jail," and "Greystone Chapel," written by Folsom inmate Glen Sherley.

At Folsom Prison's rebellious attitude and plea for compassion for the imprisoned (articulated in Cash's original liner notes and the pouring out of his soul on stage) intersected with the spirit of 1968, finding a place next to figures such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy who urged Americans to reach out to the disenfranchised and next to young Americans taking to the streets to protest war and inequality. Curious music fans and socially-conscious critics across the nation were magnetized.

This deluxe edition of At Folsom Prison also includes the DVD Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison, the first documentary film to consider Cash's finest day. Produced by award-winning director Bestor Cram and Cash biographer Michael Streissguth, the documentary follows the country star through the gates of the dark prison to reveal a moment flush with ramifications. Featuring exclusive interviews with those who accompanied Cash at Folsom Prison, friends and family, and inmates who witnessed the show, the documentary examines Cash through the lens of January 13, 1968. New footage filmed inside Folsom Prison, dramatic photographs by Jim Marshall, and rare archival material featuring Cash illustrate the album and concert's importance in a new and gripping way.

In Folsom's wake, Cash became an international ambassador of country music, prison reform spokesman, and counter-culture hero. Few albums had ever proved so influential. Forty years after its initial release, historians and critics continue to count At Folsom Prison among the classic albums of the 1960s, in a league with Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Pet Sounds, and Blonde on Blonde. As daughter Rosanne Cash observes, Cash went into Folsom Prison and "came into the light."

For a limited time, now more Essential music from your favorite artists!

In addition to all the hits on Discs 1 and 2 of these best-selling Essential collections, Limited Edition 3.0 CDs feature these additional hits and fan favorites!

* Each Essential Limited Edition 3.0 expanded 3-CD set features the biggest hits and best-loved songs from superstar artists, including material not previously available in an Essential package.

* Definitive, career-spanning and comprehensive, The Essential 3.0 series features all of the must-have selections from the biggest names in music history-now with a 3rd disc!

* Now available for the first time in eco-friendly cardboard packaging.

* Limited Edition 3.0 disc features "I Got Stripes" and "Understand Your Man."

Limited Edition 3.0 titles in stores August 26, 2008 and available for purchase from Amazon.

The Nashville Underground movement united an influential portion of country music's alienated minority of singers, songwriters, and producers in the early 1970s - and didn't let go.  By 1975, when Willie Nelson - relocated outside Austin, Texas for five years by then - released his groundbreaking debut album on Columbia Records, Red Headed Stranger, the movement was no longer underground and had a bold new name: Outlaw Country.

            With Willie Nelson as the Godfather, aided and abetted by a mob of Nashville rebels that included Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Charlie Daniels, David Allan Coe, Billy Joe Shaver, Johnny Paycheck and others, the movement gained the traction it needed to upset the establishment.  The lines between country and Southern rock had been blurred for years, and with the ascendance of the Allman Brothers, Marshall Tucker, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, there was no looking back.

            Three decades later, those artists are the cornerstones of THE VERY BEST OF OUTLAW COUNTRY, a collection that gathers together the roots and branches of one of the most enduring genres in country music history.  Bringing the music ahead into the new millennium with tracks from Travis Tritt, Gretchen Wilson, and Shooter Jennings, this generous 20-song single-CD is in stores now.