Sreechinth C - Perspicacious Johnny, Sagacious Cash: A Compilation of 400+ Wise Sayings of Johnny Cash

Perspicacious Johnny, Sagacious Cash - A Compilation o f 400+ WiseSayings o f Johnny Cash

Composer: Sreechinth.C

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DEDICATION

This book, Perspicacious Johnny,Sagacious Cash - A Compilation Of 400+ Wise Sayings of JohnnyCash is dedicated in the feet of Almighty.

You build on failure. Youuse it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don'ttry to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don'tlet it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of yourspace.

- Johnny Cash

TABLE OF Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Sincerely showing thankfulness to all thosewho participated and supported directly and indirectly in therelease of this book.

The renowned American singer andsongwriter Johnny Cash was born on26 th February 1932. Born inKingsland, Arkansas, he belonged to a poor family, his father Raywas a Southern Baptist sharecropper, and his mother was CarrieRiver Cash. In order to get a steady income he along with his wifeand seven children moved to Dyess, Arkansas. The farming policiesby President Franklin Roosevelt proved to be an advantage for Rayand there he lived in a five-room house and farmed 20 acres ofcotton and other seasonal crops. Along with his father and sixsiblings Jonny Cash also worked in fields in order to pay off theirliabilities. Listening to music was the only way to escape fromtheir hardships and his mother also used to sing in the fieldswhile he was working. At the age of 12 Cash began writing songs,his parents recognized his talent and with great difficulty theyarranged money so that he could take singing lessons. When Cashcompleted three lessons his music teacher got allured by his talentand asked him to stop taking lessons and never contravene from hisnatural voice. The impact of religion was very strong because hismother was a pious member of the Pentecostal church. His elderbrother Jack who died in 1944 in an electric-saw accident also hadan interest to join the priesthood. In his later career hisexperiences of early farming life and religion became recurringthemes. Cash completed his graduation in 1950 and in search for ajob he left Dyess. He shifted to Pontiac, Michigan and got selectedin the U.S Air forces as John.R.Cash. For his training he went toLackland Air force Base in San Antonia, Texas. During his fouryears in Air force he was stationed in Landsberg, West Germany, andworked as a radio intercept officer. The days that he spent inGermany made him more close to music; along with his few Air forcebuddies he formed a band Landsberg Barbarians. This band gaveCash an opportunity to portray his talent by playing live shows andalso take shot at songwriting. We were terrible, he commentedlater but that Lowenbrau beer will make you feel like youregreat. Wed take our instruments to these honky-tonks and playuntil they threw us out or a fight started. After he left from Airforce in July, 1954 he married Vivian and stayed in Memphis,Tennessee. There he worked as an appliance salesman. To establishhis musical career he joined with a couple of mechanics, MarshallGrant and Luther Perkins. With an old guitar that he purchased inGermany, Cash became the lead singer of that group and they refinedtheir unique synthesis of blues and country-and-western musicthrough live performances. Marshall Grant in his autobiography, IWas There When It Happened: My Life with Johnny Cash explainedabout Cash that he was a decent singer, not a great one, but therewas power and presence in his voice. The turning point in theircareer happened when they met Sam Phillips the owner of the SunRecords, he gave Cash and his team a chance to display theirskills. Philip was impressed by their sound but was not happy withthe gospel-driven songs choices and asked them to return with anoriginal song. The trio returned with Hey Porter Philip likedthat song. In May, 1955, Hey Porter was released and they signedthe newly branded Cash and the Tennessee two. The Cry, Cry, Crytheir famous work peaked at No.14 on the Billboards chart. Cashsrenowned works are So Doggone Lonesome and Folsom Prison Blue.In 1956 true fame arrived when Cash wrote and released I Walk theLine, which propelled to No.1 on the country music charts and sold2 million copies. Johnny Cash with His Hot & Blue Guitar in1957, the first album of Cash was released and with chart-topperslike Ballad of a Teenage Queen and Dont Take Your Guns to Townhe secured his fame. In 1960s Cash along with his family moved toCalifornia, he left Sun and joined Columbia Records. Cash in 1961acted in a movie Five Minutes to live and a few Western-themed TVprograms. With rising popularity and busy schedule he faced lot ofpressures and it badly affected his personnel life. All thisproblems made him a drug addict and his wife got frustrated withhis absence and in 1966 they got divorced. In the following year hewas found in a near death state by policeman in a small village inGeorgia. Later he recalled everybody said that Johnny Cash wasthrough cause, I was walking around town 150 pounds. I looked likewalking death. He came back to life when he met June Carter; theygot married on March 1, 1968. She helped him to refocus onChristianity and admitted him in a rehabilitation center. Fromthere he made a remarkable turnaround, and started hosting TheJohnny Cash Show in 1969, this show helped him to explore socialissues. In the same year he won two Grammy awards for Johnny Cashat Folsom Prison. In 1970 he was blessed with a son, John CarterCash. In the movie A Gunfight he acted with Kirk Douglas and alsopublished his autobiography Man in Black which was a best seller.He was the youngest living person to be elected to the CountryMusic Hall of Fame. In the late 1990s his physical health becameworse and was diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disease. He washospitalized for pneumonia in 1998. Due to some complications fromdiabetes he died on 12 th December 2003, aged 71. In 2005 the story of his life andcareer was depicted into a feature film, Walk the Line, starringJoaquin Phoenix as the Man in Black and Reese Witherspoon as JuneCarter.

No matter how much you'vesinned, no matter how much you've stumbled, no matter how much youfall, no matter how far you've got from God, don't give up. You canstill be redeemed. As someone says, keep the faith.

It's good to believe inyourself, but there are people out there who can make or breakyou.

Life is the question andlife is the answer, and God is the reason and love is theway.

Being rich means you getto worry about everything except money.

Help me, Jesus. I knowwhat I am.

He was removed from jailand placed in a place for the insensitive and insane.

I've got no deep voicetoday. I've got a cold. But when I was young, I had a high tenorvoice.

I wear the black for thepoor and the beaten down, Living in the hopeless, hungry side oftown.

We with Rick Rubin wouldfocus on the ones that we did like, that felt right and soundedright. And if I didn't like the performance on that song, I wouldkeep trying it and do take after take until it felt comfortablewith me and felt that it was coming out of me and my guitar and myvoice as one, that it was right for my soul.

I wear this crown ofthorns Upon my liar's chair Full of broken thoughts I cannot repairBeneath the stains of time The feelings disappear You are someoneelse I am still right here What have I become My sweetestfriend?

I got really excitedabout it. But then we went into the studio and tried to record somewith different musicians, and it didn't sound good. It didn't work.So we put together the album Unchained with just a guitar andme.