Johnny Cash – Folsom Prison Blues

About The Song

As with most artists who eventually attain legendary status, Johnny Cash’s career began modestly. He became interested in music while serving in the Air Force, teaching himself how to play the guitar, and jamming with his military buddies, singing mainly gospel and old country standards at first. Then, as he grew more confident, he began writing his own material. Upon his discharge from the service in 1954, he made his way to Memphis, Tennessee where he went to school, tried to sell appliances, worked odd jobs and played music with a couple of men Johnny had met through his brother Roy. Those two new friends, guitarist Luther Perkins and bass player Marshall Grant, would eventually become Cash’s band, the “Tennessee Two.”
After working with Perkins and Grant for several months, Cash wrangled an audition at Sun Records in March, 1955. The head of the company, Sam Phillips, was not very impressed with the boys. They were too raw and unpolished. Very matter-of-factly Phillips sent them home to hone their skills. Sensing that he needed some very special material to turn Phillips’ head, Cash went to work writing a series of new songs. When he came up with two that seemed to fit the group’s style, Johnny called and set up a second meeting at the Sun Studios. This time Phillips liked what he heard and signed Cash and his band. Those two new songs “Cry, Cry, Cry,” released as the “plug” or “A” side, and “Hey, Porter” as the “B” side, provided Cash with his first national chart record, peaking at #14 in Billboard. This was certainly no blockbuster in the grand world of music, but to a boy who had suffered through hunger and poverty as a child, this #14 ranking was the top of the world.
Sam Phillips sent Cash and the Tennessee Two on the road, usually hooking them onto Elvis Presley’s show. The exposure was a great help in allowing the boys to develop an identity and stage presence, all the while hoping for the big record that would push them into the upper bracket of popularity. The song that would put the group, and especially Cash, over the top got its inspiration from a movie.
Johnny was scheduled to catch a plane out of Memphis, but with a few hours to kill before departure, he ducked into a movie theater to pass some time. The film that was showing just happened to be “Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison,” and Johnny was instantly caught up in the tale of its primary character, a convict (played in the movie by Steve Cochran, known for his “tough-guy” roles).
Once on the plane, Cash put pen to paper, refused the complimentary meal, and crafted some new lyrics to an old blues number he had heard while serving in the Air Force in Germany. “Crescent City Blues” had been written by a jazz/blues arranger from New York City by the name of Gordon Jenkins, who worked for Decca Records. The song (recorded by Jenkins’ wife Beverly Maher) was strictly a “torch” number, very bluesy in nature using an extremely slow arrangement, buoyed by old-fashioned jazz-style horns. The tune sounded like something from the 1930s, but in reality it had been released just a couple of years earlier on Jenkins’ album “Seven Dreams.” This album placed in the lower rungs of Billboard’s pop albums chart while “Crescent City Blues” didn’t reach the singles chart at all.
Johnny Cash borrowed heavily from the original lyrics (and all of the melody) of “Crescent City Blues” to fashion his new song based around Folsom Prison as the focal point. The following day, he worked up a much-faster arrangement, allowing plenty of hot guitar licks by Luther Perkins. Cash called his new song “Folsom Prison Blues.” He told Sam Phillips that he had used “Crescent City Blues” as its base, but after finding out that the original blues number hadn’t become a hit, Phillips told Cash that there was no need to be concerned about a plagiarism lawsuit.
Johnny recorded “Folsom Prison Blues” at the Sun Studio in late 1955, but Sam judged it inappropriate for the Christmas season and delayed its release until February of ’56, when the song (crediting Cash as its sole composer) peaked at #4 on Billboard’s country singles chart. Riding the wave put in motion by “Folsom Prison Blues,” the stage was set for Johnny’s next release that would make him a bona fide star – his signature song, “I Walk the Line.”
“Folsom Prison Blues” provides a distinct link between Johnny Cash’s tenure at Sun Records and his peak years with the Columbia label. Cash signed with Columbia on August 1, 1958, and almost ten years later, “Folsom Prison Blues” re-emerged as an ever bigger live recording. The “Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison” album was recorded January 13, 1968 during Johnny’s second performance at the institution, and the title track (again listing the song’s writing credit solely to Cash) spent four weeks at #1 on Billboard’s country singles chart beginning July 20, 1968. ”Folsom Prison Blues” also made a decent #32 showing on Billboard’s “Hot 100” pop chart.
Gordon Jenkins more than likely was unaware of Johnny’s first hit version of “Folsom Prison Blues” in 1956, since that rendition was strictly limited to country music circles. Only when the 1968 record became such a runaway smash nationwide and reached a moderate high-water mark on the pop listings, did Jenkins learn about, and pay attention to, the obvious similarities between his song, “Crescent City Blues” and Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues.”
Jenkins decided to take action, filing a plagiarism lawsuit against Johnny Cash in early 1969. The suit was settled out of court with Cash paying Jenkins the sum of $75,000 for copyright infringement, a paltry tally even for 1969 standards. This low settlement amount was probably due to the fact that Jenkins’ “Crescent City Blues” not only hadn’t been a hit, the song had never appeared on any chart. It was almost totally obscure, which no doubt contributed to the small sum Gordon Jenkins accepted from Johnny Cash, whose estate continues to retain all composing and publishing rights to “Folsom Prison Blues” decades after Cash’s 2003 death.

Video

Lyrics

I hear the train a comin’
It’s rolling round the bend
And I ain’t seen the sunshine since I don’t know when
I’m stuck in Folsom prison, and time keeps draggin’ on
But that train keeps a rollin’ on down to San Antone

When I was just a baby my mama told me
“Son, always be a good boy, don’t ever play with guns”
But I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die
When I hear that whistle blowing, I hang my head and cry

I bet there’s rich folks eating in a fancy dining car
They’re probably drinkin’ coffee and smoking big cigars
Well I know I had it coming, I know I can’t be free
But those people keep a movin’
And that’s what tortures me

Well if they freed me from this prison
If that railroad train was mine
I bet I’d move it on a little farther down the line
Far from Folsom prison, that’s where I want to stay
And I’d let that lonesome whistle blow my blues away