Johnny Cash with the Tennessee Three
Emo's
Austin, TX
SXSW
March 17, 1994
75th Birthday Special
JEMS Master

Sonic Studios DSM-6P > Denon DTR-80P
DAT Master > Peak 5.2 > FLAC

01 Intro
02 Delia's Gone
03 Let the Train Blow the Whistle
04 Bird On a Wire
05 Tennessee Stud
06 Drive On
07 Thirteen
08 The Beast In Me
09 Down There By the Train
10 Like a Solider (false start--boots story)
11 Like a Solider
12 Redemption
13 The Man Who Couldn't Cry
14 Folsom Prison Blues
15 Ghost Riders in the Sky (slight diginoise after song ends and Johnny speaks)
16 I Walk the Line
17 Get Rhythm
18 Sunday Morning Coming Down
19 Big River
20 A Boy Named Sue
21 I Guess Things Happen That Way
22 Long Black Veil (brief unexplained cut of a few seconds)
23 Ring of Fire
24 "Johnny Cash ladies and gentlemen..."/Encore Break
25 Orange Blossom Special
26 Outro

"Still one of the most talked-about Austin club gigs in history is Johnny Cash's SXSW show at Emo's on March 17, 1994"--so reads a 2003 item in the Austin Chronicle.

"Johnny Cash at Emo's....It was ridiculous. I was right up front."--Rhett Miller of the Old 97s telling USA Today the best show he ever saw at SXSW.

***

At least based on a cursory Google search, it appears this performance is the stuff of legend around Austin and perhaps beyond.

I have my friend Courtney to thank for getting to the show in the first place--she insisted we line up extremely early, even with badges. It turned out she was right as hundreds were turned away at the door.

Austinites and visitors know Emo's is a legendary punk club, so the booking of Cash there was something of a statement. The crowd was delirious with delight and there was a considerable crush on the floor as we jostled to get close the Man in Black.

This is another one of those tapes I had long assumed to be problematic and I'm sure I haven't played it since 1995 when it was presumably dubbed at least a couple of times. During the encore break you can hear me say that because someone bumped into me, the mic came unplugged for about 5 minutes. Listening back, I hear a few seconds of "Long Black Veil" lost but that's it.

Cash's voice is a little thrashed (he blames the long flight from a just-completed tour of Australia to Austin) and he takes awhile to warm up, but there is something special going on, and as the show proceeds he comes to life.

This falls somewhere between a concert recording and an audio documentary of a now-legendary event. There are a few level changes that someone might be able to fuss with and improve upon but it didn't seem to matter. I did raise the levels on the acoustic set and normalize, but otherwise did no mastering. Samples provided.

I hope this proves to be something of a find for some of you. I suspect people's memory of the show is more glowing than the actual performance you'll hear given Johnny's voice, but then again, this is the start of the American Recordings era.

On Monday, February 26, Cash would have turned 75. Glad to say I got to see him once on a very special night.

Butterking for JEMS