Cashing In

Back in 1961, Johnny Cash and his then-wife Vivian hired contractors to build them a home in the hills of Casitas Springs, the small town near Ojai in Ventura County. Custom designed to fit the singer’s specifications, the home even featured a wall-mounted turntable and a writing room for Cash.

The country singer was going through a dark period at the time, including dealing with drug addiction, and he moved away only a few years later. But the area’s obsession with Cash, as elsewhere in the nation, has never really faded. There was a Johnny Cash Tribute Festival called The Roadshow Revival that took place every summer from 2009-17 at the Ventura Fairgrounds, where such acts as Kris Kristofferson, X, The Blasters, Wanda Jackson, Carlene Carter (Cash’s step-daughter), Reverend Horton Heat, and Billy Joe Shaver paid their respects to the Man in Black, who passed away in 2003. Over the years there have also been untold imitators who have made careers by walking the line – dressing like, and shaping their voices to sound like Johnny Cash himself to perform tribute shows, including Ventura’s own the Mighty Cash Cats.

Now, the Cash-curious are getting two more opportunities, as another pair of Cash-centric shows are jumping into the ring of fire and heading our way: a single-night tribute concert to the Man in Black at the Lobero by a guy named James Garner, and Ring of Fire: The Music of Johnny Cash, the Broadway hit musical that has an extended run at the Ensemble’s New Vic as part of the 2023-24 season. Coincidentally, Garner’s take on Cash at the Lobero takes place on November 30, the same night that Ring of Fire begins previews for its December 2-17 run.

For Garner, the more attention on Cash the better, as the singer-rhythm guitarist has been obsessed with the Man in Black since the first time he heard Cash sing. That was on a cassette tape in 1991, when the 11-year-old Garner discovered that his dad – who kept to himself when he wasn’t working at a cotton farm, same as Cash – was going to see the singer at a local concert in Hanford, California.

“Don’t Take Your Guns to Town” rumbled out of the speakers, and Garner was a goner.

“It was like the whole world opened up,” Garner recalled in a baritone speaking voice that echoes Cash. “It sounded so different than anything on the radio, so sparse in instrumentation and Cash’s voice was so huge, telling this story that resonated deep in me, and I was hooked.”

The experience launched Garner into a “years-long deep dive – it was all Johnny Cash all the time for me as a kid, even up through my college years. I wore black all the time and he was all I listened to in my car and at home.”

It wasn’t until his mid-20s that Garner was able to channel his Cash-centricities beyond karaoke when a drummer at a roadside bar in Lodi heard him sing and suggested they form a tribute band. Over the last 16 years, Garner and his quartet have played more than 600 professional shows, including one Folsom State Prison in 2008 to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Cash’s famous album. The tribute show focuses on the earlier hits from Cash’s career, including “Folsom Prison Blues,” “Ring of Fire,” “I Walk the Line,” and many more, including B-sides and deeper cuts that resurrect the classic Johnny Cash voice and rhythm.

“The hits can fill the show, but he had a huge catalog, so we try to pull out some songs that the audience may not ever have heard Johnny sing,” he said.

Over the years, Garner and the band have even released three full-length albums, which are hits with his fans.

“I always tell them to listen to the real deal and go buy Johnny Cash records, but I guess they want to have something to take home at the end of the night,” he said. “I mean, I’m not Johnny Cash. I tell the stories behind the songs, but I talk about him in the third person at the show. I’m still just a fan.”

ETC’s Ring of Fire is a very different animal, a jukebox musical that employs five actor-musicians that eschew impersonation to tell Cash’s life story through his songs spanning his full career. Audiences will likely find the experiences quite different.

And to complete the circle of coincidences, the Broadway at the Granada series launches its new season with The Cher Show – which employs three different actresses to portray the star singer in succeeding eras of her career – on December 6 and 7, smack in the middle of Ring of Fire’s run.