“The Johnny Cash Show,” The Man Cub and Me

I recently purchased from our internet friends at ebay a DVD collection of complete, unedited versions of the first 20 Johnny Cash variety shows, which ran on ABC-TV back when I was a young cub myself.

I don’t recollect watching it at the time it was originally broadcast – television was one of the many connections to the outside world my curiously insular upbringing denied me. If I could sneak it in the afternoon, I was hip (thus I knew that Chicago, for instance, was Mike Douglas’ kind of town and never to call on Charles Nelson Reilly on “Match Game”). If it was prime-time though, it was whatever Dad wanted to watch, and Dad wasn’t big on variety shows (with the exception of Carol Burnett’s). I can still remember staying up late one night to catch Steve Martin on SNL, sitting on the floor busting a gut, while my Dad sat at the dining room table, stoically chain-smoking his beloved Tareytons and looking at me the way he often did, with a bewildered, defeated look in his eyes.

But now I have the first 20 Johnny Cash variety hours, and not just the clip-jobs previously available as bootlegs, and soon to be released officially for the first time, but the whole shows, even the godawful crap. For instance, so far, “comedian” Charlie Callas has turned up twice. In case you don’t remember, his act consisted solely of babbling incoherently like a speedfreak with Tourette’s syndrome trapped in a helium factory. The crowd ate it up both times. Pat Boone defiled one episode with his bland white-bread pop. He really was as inoffensive as you’ve heard and is in retrospect both hilarious and embarrassing. To its credit, the crowd seemed as indifferent to Boone’s crooning as The Man Cub and I were.

On the other hand, in just the first 20 shows, guests included Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt, The Monkees, Marty Robbins, Merle Haggard, Tom T. Hall, Melanie, Chet Atkins, Odetta, Roger Miller, Carl Perkins, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, CCR, Roy Orbison, Arlo Guthrie, The Everly Brothers, Neil Diamond and Ray Charles. And those were just the A-Listers.

I’ve started leaving the discs queued-up for the morning, so The Man Cub and I can watch together while he’s enjoying his morning sippy-cup of milk and waking up. Just this morning, we watched the Neil Diamond episode. It was terrific! He came out and did a new song at the time, “Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show,” and did a spoken section in the middle where he talked about how he came to write the song, and without missing a beat segued back into the rousing climax of the tune. I’ve heard him do that song dozens of times, and it’s never sounded as fresh as it did on “The Johnny Cash Show.”

And even the shows with less-than-stellar line-ups (example, show #4: Buffy St. Marie, The Cowsills and Doug McClure) are redeemed by Cash’s regular “Ride This Train” segment, where he wove back-catalog tunes into a loose narrative about trains and their impact on the growth of America. Again this morning, he pulled out an obscure favorite, “The Whirl and The Suck,” explained what the title meant and then proceeded to delight The Man Cub and I with a spot-on run-through of it. The boy liked it so much he popped his thumb out of his mouth at the end of the tune and clapped along with the studio audience.

Cash also usually sat down for an ‘impromptu’ duet with at least one of each week’s guests, and even though obviously scripted, it’s clear there was plenty of room for improvisation left open for the visiting artists. Roger Miller just about had Cash in stitches and at one point giggled uncontrollably, then explained, “I just told myself a dirty joke!” Cash’s affection for the man was written all over his face.

Also a staple of every show was the gospel number at the end, and his selection of material couldn’t be beat. From time-worn Pentacostal hymns to Carter Family tunes to newly composed songs that the rigors of a weekly television show hadn’t allowed him the studio time to put on record yet, his closing gospel number was always a highlight of the show. And probably, along with the weekly train medley, the main reason Cash agreed to do the show in the first place.

I’ll still buy the official clip-job when it’s released next week, but I’m also keeping my eyes peeled for the rest of the unedited episodes. I guarantee you, most of the true gems (including the train medleys, back-catalog chestnuts and gospel closers) will be left on the cutting room floor of the official clip-job in favor of solo numbers from the big-name guest stars.

Due to rights issues, we’ll probably never see official full-season releases of “The Johnny Cash Show.” But as long as we have the internets and the ebay… only a shortfall of ready cash will keep The Man Cub and me from the rest of the unedited episodes of “The Johnny Cash Show.”