This blogpost is a rerun. We share it with you again today in honor of the new Johnny Cash biopic,“Walk the Line,” starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon. Enjoy.
The Beer Guy told this story the other night at the Westville:
Well, I’ve seen Johnny Cash in concert. Let me tell you my Johnny Cash story.
Johnny was playing a concert in Bristol, Tennessee. I think it was 1978 or ’79 or something like that. They’d set this concert up as a fundraiser for a country music museum they wanted to build. They lined up some big acts, like Ricky Scaggs and the Carter family and, of course, Johnny.
Well, they built this little wooden stage in a big field outside of Bristol.
we miss you, Johnny I was covering entertainment for the newspaper, and I went to the show. About 10,000 people showed up for the concert.
The only thing was, nobody thought about how to get these acts to the stage, because it was just a big, wide-open field. So Johnny rolled up in his limo and got out, and was surrounded by state troopers, who proceeded to part the mases like Moses and the Red Sea.
I was walking through the crowd with them, as close as you are to me right now, when this little old man – or little old lady, I don’t remember which – muscled his way through the crowd and thrust forward a gnarled paw.
“Johnny! Johnny!” he said. “Johnny, this here’s a picture of Jesus in the clouds, and I want you to have it.”
Sure enough, I saw it was a picture of Jesus, Jesus up in the clouds.
Johnny stopped. He took the picture and he said, “Uh, thank you” (in extra deep johnny voice). And he kept on walking.
Johnny
That’s my Johnny Cash story.
2 Comments
Thanks a good ‘un, WL!
Mine’s better.
Johnny Cash in the bathroom at Charlotte Douglass International Airport. Summer 1995.
While using the facilities and about to finish at the urinal, I spy out of the corner of my eye a man walking up all dressed in black.
As I wash up at the sink, I start thinking ‘Man, that guy looks just like Johnny Cash.’
A minute later he walks over to wash his hands and I say. ‘Excuse me, but I’m sure you must get this all the time. You look just like Johnny Cash. Are you him?’
In a gravel voice, the man says:
“I wuz when I woke up this mornin’. I just hope I am when I go to bed tonight.’
I said thanks and that was it.
Nuff said. Lightnin’ met Johnny Cash.
Rumble, rumble, rumble. Lightnin’ has spoken. Suckas.
-WL-