Music : The Man Comes Around [Bonus Tracks]

Rating: - Pure Brilliance
Truly a spectacular album culminating in the emotional "we'll meet agin" featuring the whole Cash family. Other stand-out tracks include "The Man Comes Around", the Beatles cover "In My Life", The Eagles "Desparado" and the quite astonishing Nine Inch Nails cover "Hurt". The voice and tone is still as fantastic as ever. Music has lost a great man

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Rating: - Why can't all music be this good?
Albums like this should be played to all of the Pop idol/reality TV idiots as a demonstation of what music is really about, there is more emotion in one word of one of Cash's renditions than the whole current top forty.
Before listening to this album I knew little of Cash or his work. Like too many people I first came into contact with the man in black through the achingly heartfelt and emotional rendition of Hurt and it's brilliantly sad video on MTV. It was one of those rare occassions where you hear a record and everything just stops,you are totally compelled to sit and listen to the genius of it all. I brought this album the next day, wondering if the rest could really be as powerfull. To my relief it is. A mixture of Cash's own compositions and an eclectic choice of covers, (Depeche Mode to Hank Williams).The standouts for me were obviously Hurt, but also Personal Jesus, I hung my Head, Big Iron and The Man Comes Around. Yes the vocals are occassionally a little strained and musically all are simple stripped down accoustic numbers, but that's not the point. You are buying this album not for it's flashy production or the impressive list of guest artists. All you get is a legendary artist performing with amazing honesty and emotion, I think thats all that can be asked of any musician.

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Rating: - He'll be sorely missed
This is the latest in the line of American Recordings produced by Rick Rubin and continues the successful formula of Johnny Cash, with a minimum of backing, mostly covering songs which you wouldn't associate with country music.
The real triumph on this album is his cover of "Hurt" a song about drug addiction, which Johnny brings a whole new meaning to, and if listened to in conjunction with the award winning video, in which he looks so vulnerable, in contrast to that strong bass voice, it's extremely moving.
His own song, the title track "When the man comes around" is the strongest song he's written in years.
I always think his voice works best when he sings songs you don't expect and this is demonstrated on "personal Jesus" which is another standout track.
I don't think the covers of "Brige over troubled water","Desperado",I hung my head" or "streets of Laredo" work to the same degree. They are not badly done, they just don't drag you out of your comfort zone in the way covers of artists such as Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode and on his previous album U2, Nick Cave and Will Oldham do.
All considered, definitely a good buy, but doesn't quite match the heights achieved by American III, Solitary Man.

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Rating: - A work of melancholy genius.
I'm not genarlly a fan of country and western music, my CD collection tends toward rock, punk and grunge with a liberal dose of female singer/songwriters. My friend Paul is not a country fan, his tastes running toward extreme metal music in many cases. But this is an album that defies listeners of all stripes, ages and tastes- a peice of work so pure and, at times, gut wrenchingly simple that it crosses boundaries.

It has been said that Johhny Cash knew he was going to die when he started work on the album and that this was to be his final opus. If that is the case he could have left no finer epitaph. In every case he has taken a song written by someone else and improved on it (contrast the soulessness of Sting's version of his own "I Hung My Head" to the passion of Cash's which contains more than one moment where the listener should struggle not to cry), or he has given a last gift of a few of his own songs.

Highlights, if any can be singled out, include Cash doing Nine Inch Nails (one for the "Anything can happen..." files) and improving the song's formula a hundredfold, Cash doing "Bridge Over Troubled Water" as no one else has ever attempted, and a song which could easily be underrated, "First Time Ever I Saw Your Face".

In all the gloom he even manages to play with the listener a bit, "Tear Stained Letter" being a self penned peice of whimsy and "Sam Hall" being perhaps a glimpse of the younger somewhat wilder Man In Black facing death with a grin and a snarl.

Cash died with an abiding love of God, music and his wife, all three are apparent on this album. The kind of emotional intensity and downright magnificence engendered on this album leaves all those and us poorer for his loss.

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Rating: - Utterly beautiful...
From the second this album starts, you know you're dealing with something special. I've never listed to Johnny Cash before, but thought I'd take a punt on this just to see what the fuss was about. And what a good idea that was! There's some stunning songs on here, ranging from the wonderful covers of Hurt and Personal Jesus to the title track.

I'd advise buying the version with the video for Hurt on it, as that really helps put things in perspective and is thoroughly moving.