Johnny’s to-do list from 1973. He was born on February 26, so today, we celebrate with a ton of covers!
A is for Adams. Ryan Adams. And his Cash cover…
A is also for A Boy Named Sue, a poem by Shel Silverstein that Johnny covered as a song…
B is for a couple of good covers of the Ballad of a Teenage Queen.
C is for CCR’s “Have You Ever Seen The Rain?”
D is for Danzig, who wrote the song “13” for Johnny and then recorded it themselves years later.
E is for “Everybody’s Trying to Be My Baby,” a Carl Perkins song made famous by The Beatles and covered by Johnny.
F is for Folsom Prison. Johnny’s biggest song. Tons of covers. Here’s some interesting ones.
G could have been for Get Rhythm, one of his biggest hits, but I really like the song Guess Things Happen That Way. Especially when Emmylou sings it.
H is for “Hey, Porter!”
I is for “I Won’t Back Down.” Lots and lots of folks have covered Tom Petty’s resistance anthem. Johnny’s version is one of the best.
J is for Johnny’s cover of Springsteen’s, “Johnny 99.” Powerful.
Johnny also covered another Bruce tune…
K is for Kris Kristofferson’s version of To Beat the Devil.
L is for Nick Lowe, who wrote “The Beast in Me,” a fantastic song written for Johnny and recorded by him and a few others.
M is for The Man, as in “When the Man Comes Around.” One of his biggest songs, and one of his most covered. Here’s a few really good ones.
N is for “No Expectations,” from The Rolling Stones’ country(ish) period. Cash made this little-known, simple song his own…
O is for “One,” a U2 song that Johnny subsumed as his own.
P is for piece. As in, Johnny’s great workingman blues tune, One Piece At A Time.
Q is for San Quentin, the less-famous song about a prison written by Johnny Cash.
R is for “Redemption Song.” Two fantastic now deceased singer songwriters covering another deceased and brilliant singer songwriter.
S is for Soundgarden’s Rusty Cage.
T is for The Line. Can you believe that Connie Francis is among the over one hundred folks that have covered this song, along with Mr. Spock?
U is for U2’s duet with Johnny on his song, “The Wanderer.” U2 and Johnny really got along! (See “O” above.”
For “V” we’ll take the v in teleVision. One of Johnny’s early hits was the theme to the show “The Rebel.” It’s been covered by a few artists. Here’s a metal version.
W is for Johnny’s monster hit, “Wanted Man.”
Y is for “You Are My Sunshine.” Johnny didn’t write this one, the first recording is by the Pine Ridge Boys back in 1939, but he did a mean cover…
Y is also for Yelawolf, who paid tribute to the Man in Black…
Z is for Bobby Zimmerman’s cover of Johnny’s song, “Train of Love.”
