Memories are unreliable, filled with condensations, displacements, distortions, and outright errors. Nonetheless, my first memory in life seems to be hearing this record, one of the few LPs in my parents’ collection in the mid-1960s. “Ring of Fire” is my clearest memory. I loved it so much that in kindergarten, when we were asked to teach songs to the other children, I sang “Ring of Fire”, not “Itsy Bitsy Spider” or anything along those lines. I didn’t see the humour in it, because I was in love with that song, that album, and with music.
My love of all of the above has never wavered.
Back in 2007, in the early days of my 1000 Songs Facebook Group, I wrote about “Ring of Fire” (https://www.facebook.com/notes/1000-songs/song-19-ring-of-fire/10150202361111451/):
I don't remember anything before "Ring of Fire." This might quite literally be true. My earliest memories in life include listening to music on my parent's "hi-fidelity stereo" system. We had certain records (mostly 45s) that could be played on the "record player" and others (mostly 33 1/3 LPs) that could only be played on the stereo system. Now, I remember my dad actually getting the stereo system so we must have been playing the Cash albums on something before that, but it's all a bit of a blur. "Ring of Fire" was recorded in March, 1963 and I was born six months later so it's understandable.
But I couldn't have heard it, in fact, until 1967 when Johnny Cash's Greatest Hits Volume 1 came out, an album that my mother played incessantly, as did I, once I was trusted with the stereo system (and later when I got my own copy). We only had a handful of albums and this was one of them, as well as at least one other Cash album that we got the next year, the classic live album At Folsom Prison, and I believe its brilliant sister album, At San Quentin.
I loved every cut on the Cash albums we had and, as it turns out, had memorized the songs word for word. So, when I got to kindergarten and was asked to sing a song to the class, instead of "Itsy Bitsy Spider" or something like that, I sang "Ring of Fire" to the class. I just loved that song and still do today. And, despite the fact that the Sun years aren't well represented on the collection (it's all material from 1959-1966, mostly Columbia but, for some reason, at least some Sun-originated material like "I Walk the Line"), and that I now also love so much work that followed, including the miraculous Rick Rubin-produced albums, my understanding of Cash was really formed with this pantheon:
Jackson (though the At Folsom Prison version is the classic)
I Walk the Line
Understand Your Man
Orange Blossom Special
The One on the Right is on the Left
Ring of Fire
It Ain't Me Babe (my first Dylan song? Or possibly Peter, Paul & Mary's Blowin' in the Wind?)
The Ballad of Ira Hayes
The Rebel - Johnny Yuma (I have memories of a "Yuban" commercial being set to this song - that can't be true, can it?)
Five Feet High and Rising
Don't Take Your Guys to Town
Wow! What an amazing collection of songs.
"Ring of Fire" itself was penned by June Carter and Merle Kilgore and was Cash's biggest hit single. The song is about June's falling in love with Cash, now immortalized as a cliche in the film Walk the Line (I'm not a fan but I want to stay as positive as possible in my postings! I won't always succeed). The original recording of th song was by Anita Carter, June's sister. Cash heard it and claims that in a dream her heard the song accompanied by Mexican horns and decided that his version had to be rendered thus, with mariachi horns.
There are tons of cover versions. The first one I remember hearing was by Wall of Voodoo about 35 years ago (or more... I'm getting old!). It was goofy but I still like it.
Social Distortion did a punk-ish version that was a minor hit (it's OK). Frank Zappa did a parody (not his strongest moment). I have a nice version by Elvis Costello (and someone else - can't remember off the top of my head). There are many 1960s versions I've yet to hear by Kitty Wells, Jerry Lee Lewis, Dave Dudley, and Tom Jones (! - released in 1967). But the song is so inextricably Johnny Cash's that I'm not sure it's ever going to become a "standard" in that sense.
