Johnny Cash The Mystery of Life

180g Vinyl LP Remastered from the Original Mercury Master Tapes by Kevin Reeves at UMG Studios Nashville

Johnny Cash is one of music's true legends and a titan in the music pantheon. While his recordings for Sun, Columbia and American have been well serviced over the years, his Mercury Records catalogue has been conspicuous in its absence in the reissue market. With the new compilation Easy Rider: The Best of the Mercury Recordings and the box set The Complete Mercury Albums 1986-1991 plus stand alone 180g vinyl LP releases of Class of 55: Memphis Rock and Roll Homecoming (1986), Johnny Cash Is Coming to Town (1987), Classic Cash: Hall of Fame Series (1988), Water from the Wells of Home (1988), Boom Chicka Boom (1990), and The Mystery of Life (1991) on offer in 2020, the project is expected to deliver some richly deserved profile to an important but under-served slice of The Man In Black's repertoire. 

This deep dive into a lesser-discussed period of Cash's career provides an important link to the celebrated resurgence he enjoyed under the production of Rick Rubin with the American Recordings series, from 1994. Respected music journalist Scott Schinder notes that the recordings "stand as a notable transitional body of work, and an illuminating prelude to the full-blown creative resurgence that Cash would experience in the 1990s." This prolific period for the Man In Black, after the end of his 30-year association with Columbia Records, encompassed six albums in five years, at a time when he was also still touring extensively.

1991's The Mystery of Life was Cash's last for Mercury Records. The songs featured are culled from both recent sessions and from leftovers from Cash's first Mercury session in 1986 for the album Johnny Cash is Coming to Town. It includes new recordings of two songs already associated with him from his Sun and Columbia days, "Hey Porter" and "Wanted Man." "I'll Go Somewhere and Sing My Songs Again" is a duet with Tom T. Hall.