Johnny Cash had a long-time affinity for the work of — and for his friendship with — Bob Dylan.
In his book Cash: The Autobiography, Johnny wrote of being on the road in the early ‘60s. “I had a portable record player that I’d take along on the road, and I’d put on Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan backstage, then go out and do my show, then listen again as soon as I came off.
“After a while at that, I wrote Bob a letter telling him how much of a fan I was,” he said. “He wrote back almost immediately, saying he’d been following my music since I Walk the Line, and so we began a correspondence.”
The two finally met in person during the 1964 Newport Folk Festival. They remained close friends for the remaining 40 years of John’s life. When his friend died in 2003, Dylan wrote, “In plain terms, Johnny was — and is — the North Star; you could guide your ship by him, the greatest of the greats, then and now.”
“Truly he is what the land and country is all about,” continued Dylan, “the heart and soul of it personified and what it means to be here; and he said it all in plain English. I think we can have recollections of him, but we can’t define him, any more than we can define a fountain of truth, light and beauty.”
Despite their mutual admiration, Dylan and Cash collaborated only one time. That was on Dylan’s landmark 1969 recording of the Nashville Skyline album, produced by Bob Johnston.
Johnston also had produced Cash’s At Folsom Prison the year earlier, and he hoped he could get the two artists to record an entire album together. To that end, Cash and Dylan recorded 15 songs together at the Nashville sessions, but ended up keeping only one of those tracks, “Girl from the North Country.”
About This Song
Among those 15 tracks was one of Cash’s all-time favorite Dylan compositions, the wistful “One Too Many Mornings,” which Bob wrote for his third studio album, The Times They Are a-Changin’.
As noted here recently, the song was famously among a series of tunes Dylan wrote after his breakup with his lover Suze Rotolo.
After its album release in 1964, the song sometimes pops up on Dylan’s set lists, notably during his 1966 world tour and then, 10 years later, in his second Rolling Thunder Revue tour.
But Johnny Cash embraced the song even more, covering it numerous times, including on the album Johnny & June in 1978.
He recorded it again in 1986 as a duet with Waylon Jennings for their Heroes album.
In 2012, a remix combining Cash's original vocals with new recordings by the Avett Brothers was included on the benefit album Chimes of Freedom: The Songs of Bob Dylan Honoring 50 Years of Amnesty International.
Meanwhile, Johnny and Waylon’s vocals on that original Heroes rendition later were augmented by Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson when the four of them created the supergroup The Highwaymen in the 1990s.
Our Take on the Tune
Charlie Bowen started doing this song back in college to have something to sing and play to the jam sessions in the dorms.
It then was one of the songs Charlie brought along in that summer and fall of 1974 when Dave Peyton, Roger Samples and he started The Flood.
And this lonely, lovely Dylan tune is still welcome at Flood gatherings, as you can heard on this track from last week’s rehearsal.
Want More Bob?
By the way, if you’d like a little more Dylan in your diet, The Flood has an entire Bob-centric playlist set in up the free Radio Floodango music streaming service.
Share this post