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Johnny Cash: Decades of Hits playlist. Johnny Cash was one of country music's most influential and indelible icons. His trademark baritone growl and disdainful sneer framed reams of songs that he recorded over decades. These songs -- "I Walk the Line," "Ring of Fire" and "A Boy Named Sue" among them -- are cemented in the lexicon of not only country music, but popular culture as well.
Cash's unique sound wasn't complex by any means. No doubt inspired by his upbringing on his family's cotton farm in Arkansas, his Southern gothic-tinged narratives and lighthearted country tunes were simple, straightforward slices of life, warts and all. Most would touch on the universal themes of love, God and murder -- in fact, Love, God, Murder was the title of his 2000 retrospective offering.
When Johnny Cash left the U.S. Air Force in 1954, he headed to Memphis. He auditioned for legendary Sun Records founder Sam Phillips, with the hopes of becoming a gospel singer. Phillips had other ideas, and when Cash presented the mogul with "Cry, Cry, Cry" and "Hey Porter," Phillips knew he was onto something. Ironically, it was partly his new boss' refusal to let Cash record a gospel album that led to the singer signing with Columbia in 1958.
With his career in overdrive, the singer became addicted to the amphetamines that helped him keep up his furious pace. By 1968 -- and with the help of June Carter, whom he would marry later that year -- Cash kicked his addiction (though he would struggle again with addiction in later years). The rest of the decade was his most fruitful period: At Folsom Prison and At San Quentin earned Gold status; Cash was named Entertainer of the Year and Male Vocalist of the Year by the Country Music Association; and The Johnny Cash Show premiered on NBC.
For any artist, success over multiple decades reflects an ability and willingness to reinvent yourself in a way that attracts each successive generation of new fans. This is certainly true of Cash, who in 1985 joined fellow outlaw artists Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson in The Highwaymen, and in 1993 joined forces with hip super-producer Rick Rubin. In both cases, Cash was rewarded with chart success, Grammys, more CMAs love, a few MTV Awards, and even passage into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
The Man in Black passed away in Nashville, Tenn., on September 12, 2003, due to complications brought on by diabetes. He survived his beloved wife by just four months. In honor of his 80th birthday on February 26th, we've assembled some of our favorite albums from the great Johnny Cash. 
The Fabulous Johnny Cash
Johnny Cash's third entry on a list of releases that approached 10 zillion by the time he died in 2003, The Fabulous Johnny Cash came out in 1958 -- his first album after leaving Sun Records. With his trademark horse-trot rhythm in full effect, there is virtually no difference between this and his more famous material. A complex storyteller, he combined first-person confessionals with a straight, non-tortured religious song ("That's Enough"); "I Still Miss Someone" is one of his all-time classics, but don't miss the epic "Don't Take Your Guns to Town," which spent six weeks in the No. 1 spot. [Mike McGuirk ]
At Folsom PrisonFour decades after Johnny Cash broke an unwritten taboo and recorded in front of inmates at Folsom Prison, his accomplishment still stands alone in pop culture. Hippies and hicks alike came to Cash to revel in the somber velvet of his singing, his immersion in the American songbook and his championing of a still-despised prison population. On this 40th-anniversary edition, we get the two shows in full for the first time, uncensored and including warm-up performances by The Statler Brothers and Carl Perkins, a comic poem by the irrepressible June Carter Cash, and much more. [Sarah Bardeen]
His Sun Years: Down SouthJohnny Cash became a star at Sun Records and was the regional label's biggest seller, earning the rare right to cut a complete album there. All the "Man in Black" elements are in place here: the train-track rhythms, the stoic baritone, the devious humor and the common-man persona (which, on "Folsom Prison Blues," turns dark). Cash worked in a stylistic straitjacket, yet these 20 tracks overflow with love, laughs, tears, violent sin and gospel redemption. Is this rock, country, backwoods gospel or Southern showbiz? Cash was a complex man who made deceptively simple music. [Nick Dedina]
The Great Lost PerformanceThis exquisite recording of Johnny Cash and family was taped in 1990 at the Paramount Theatre in Asbury Park, N.J. But the recording is so clean and warm that it almost sounds like it was recorded in a studio with the audience overdubbed. The previously unrecorded gospel song "What Is Man" proves to be the standout gem here, with overflowing female harmonies on the chorus and Lucy Clark lending a sweet voice on the duet parts. Of course, hearing the late June Carter Cash sing "Jackson" with her man never gets old. Johnny and June still sounded vibrant and young even in 1990. [Eric Shea]
Ragged Old FlagCash proves how confusing the early 1970s were by following up a heartfelt patriotic spoken-word piece (tailored for Vietnam and the Watergate scandal) with a ditty about toxic pollution ruining a family fishing trip, and then spinning off with a standard truckin' number. From there you get upbeat praises of God and the story of a prisoner afraid to face the outside world. [N.D.]
American IV: The Man Comes AroundAlthough Johnny Cash successfully put his personal stamp on plenty of cover songs during his life, none implanted themselves as firmly as the songs on The Man Comes Around. With a warbling, almost fragile voice, Cash delivered raw, powerful versions of these songs, which are as beautiful as they are dark and melancholy. [Linda Ryan]
Orange Blossom SpecialNo one did train songs or prison tunes better than Johnny Cash. The title track was one of 1965's biggest and best hits, while "The Wall" is his most tender prison ballad. Those numbers play to his fan base, but this is where Cash became a "red" rebel to Nashville, recording a number of Dylan tracks and the pro-civil rights protest song "All God's Children Ain't Free." [N.D.]
Carryin' OnIf you think Johnny Cash's Nine Inch Nails cover, "Hurt," is weirdly wonderful, check out his standout version of Ray Charles' "What'd I Say." The Man in Black proves he's always known how to make a song his own by turning it into an upbeat country-soul ditty on this 1967 album with future wife June Carter. A great record. [E.S.]
LifeJoining Cash's other themed collections, Life, as its title suggests, is bustling with songs chronicling his life's trials, tribulations and triumphs. Highlights include "The Night Hank Williams Came to Town," "I Talk to Jesus Every Day" and the down home-y "Country Trash." Although all 18 tracks are from Cash's back catalog, the sequence is captivating. [E.S.]
Legend of Johnny Cash Vol. IIIf you've exhausted all the obvious Johnny Cash hits (or if you can't get enough of the Man in Black), Vol. II is stacked with a rich sequence of songs that every fan needs. "Ballad of a Teenage Queen" is a honky-tonkin' story of a small-town girl gone to Hollywood. June Carter's loving harmonies on Bob Dylan's "It Ain't Me Babe" will warm you up. Cash's down-home duet with Dylan himself on "Girl from the North Country" is comforting like a homemade quilt. And the six songs pulled from Rick Rubin's American sessions are preciously intimate, especially his cover of Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down." [L.R.]