Not that it’s any sort of accurate measure, as my collection is likely to grow before the end (there’s already a small pile of picks from a collection I found on a curb awaiting entry into the collection), but this entry marks the halfway point of my project of blogging through my entire record collection (which I thought would be done like…two years ago).
More importantly, it also marks the end of the large queue of assorted picks that have been waiting for the past year for me to go through so I can progress with my collection as usual (instead of middle-of-the-road 70s rock that I’ve picked up for cheap/free that I don’t actually want to listen to, hence the delay).
And what a way to get back to business than with Carryin’ On with Johnny Cash and June Carter, the famously dry-witted, mud-slingin’, square dancin’ album of duets between two of country-western’s biggest names. Jackson is legendary, as is their version of Bob Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me, Babe.” But the less celebrated tunes are just as wryly hilarious and tender—”Long Legged Guitar Pickin’ Man” sees the two trading insults, while “Shantytown” is as tender a ballad as they ever did. Their versions of Ray Charles’ “I Got a Woman” and “What I Say” are fantastic as well, even if the funky electric piano of the latter is a little out of place alongside the finger picked acoustic guitars on every other song.
And what a way to get back to business than with Carryin’ On with Johnny Cash and June Carter, the famously dry-witted, mud-slingin’, square dancin’ album of duets between two of country-western’s biggest names. Jackson is legendary, as is their version of Bob Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me, Babe.” But the less celebrated tunes are just as wryly hilarious and tender—”Long Legged Guitar Pickin’ Man” sees the two trading insults, while “Shantytown” is as tender a ballad as they ever did. Their versions of Ray Charles’ “I Got a Woman” and “What I Say” are fantastic as well, even if the funky electric piano of the latter is a little out of place alongside the finger picked acoustic guitars on every other song.