Johnny

Over the course of five mesmerizing CDs, Unearthed shows us just how Johnny Cash's now-legendary handful of recordings for American Records came to be. Four discs feature previously unreleased tracks from the famed Rick Rubin-produced sessions. Through their inconsistencies and quirks (and, more often than not, brilliance), they shed light on how Cash's final records were shaped, edited, and produced. Here we get some creative pairings: Fiona Apple providing guest vocals on Cat Stevens' "Father & Son," and the late Joe Strummer duetting with Cash on Bob Marley's "Redemption Song."

After two late-'60s albums on Columbia, Johnny Winter hit his stride in 1970 working with Rick Derringer and the McCoys, now recruited as his sidemen and collaborators (and proving with just about every note here how far they'd gotten past "Hang on Sloopy"). In place of the bluesy focus on his first two albums, Winter extended himself into more of a rock-oriented mode here, in both his singing and his selection of material. This was hard rock with a blues edge, and had a certain commercial smoothness lacking in his earlier work. Derringer's presence on guitar and as a songwriter saw to it that Winter's blues virtuosity was balanced by perfectly placed guitar hooks, and the two guitarists complemented each other perfectly throughout as well.

There are only so many artists whose recording careers were expansive enough that you could collect 100 songs on five discs and not run out of worthwhile material, but Johnny Cash was just that kind of musician, a man who turned out memorable music at a remarkable pace during his glory days in the '50s, '60s, and '70s. 100 Hits Legends: Johnny Cash is, as the title suggests, a box set that includes 100 tunes from Cash's nearly 60 years of record-making, and remarkably enough, the bulk of this material was recorded during Cash's relatively brief tenure with Sun Records, his first label that put his music on wax from 1954 to 1958…

Although primarily remembered as a country music icon, his genre-spanning songs and sound embraced rock and roll, rockabilly, blues, folk, and gospel. This crossover appeal won Cash the rare honor of multiple induction in the Country Music, Rock and Roll, and Gospel Music Halls of Fame…

You've got to be a Johnny Cash fan to truly appreciate what's happening on the third volume in Legacy's Bootleg series Live Around the World. This double-disc collection contains 53 tracks culled from 23 years, 1956 to 1979. The heart of its performances are from the Newport Folk Festival in 1964; a show for the troops in Long Binh, Vietnam in 1969; for Richard Nixon at the White House in 1970, and at the Osteraker Prison in Sweden in 1972…