Johnny Cash with June Carter Cash - Irving Plaza, New York City, 7-9-1996

In my opinion, there are two Johnny Cash concert recordings from the later half of his career that tower above all others. I posted one of them here already, of him in Austin, Texas, in 1994. This is the other one. Although it's a bootleg, it's from a radio broadcast and sounds as good as an official album. There are no official albums from his 1990s career revival. If you're a fan of his music at all, you really should get this one. Since it comes from the very end of his touring years, it serves as a good career retrospective.

In 1994, Cash put out the "American Recordings" album, which marked the start of his late career revival. He followed that up with the "Unchained" album in 1996. The Austin concert I mentioned above featured many songs from "American Recordings." This concert only included one song from that. But it has a middle section with six songs in a row that all come from "Unchained." I really like that, because while he put out a handful of excellent albums in the years before he died in 2003, he effectively stopped touring after supporting "Unchained" in 1996 and 1997. He only made some short appearances where he played older hits. So this is the best example of him playing any songs he recorded in his last years.

Aside from that stretch of "Unchained" songs, the rest of the concert has the standard Johnny Cash hits set list. But he was still in good shape in 1996, vocally and energetically. There's a long stretch near the end of the show where his wife June Carter Cash plays some songs with him and some by herself. She plays so much that I've added her to the billing.

Johnny Cash talks some between songs, though not nearly as much as he did during the Austin show. He mostly comments on his new songs. His wife was much more talkative when she was on stage. I didn't have to make many sonic adjustments since this sounded excellent already, but I broke the talking into separate tracks, and sometimes boosted the volume when the talking grew faint.

01 Folsom Prison Blues (Johnny Cash)
02 Get Rhythm (Johnny Cash)
03 Sunday Morning Coming Down (Johnny Cash)
04 [Ghost] Riders in the Sky (Johnny Cash)
05 A Cowboy's Prayer - Oh, Bury Me Not (Johnny Cash)
06 talk (Johnny Cash)
07 I Never Picked Cotton (Johnny Cash)
08 talk (Johnny Cash)
09 Unchained (Johnny Cash)
10 Rowboat (Johnny Cash)
11 talk (Johnny Cash)
12 Rusty Cage (Johnny Cash)
13 talk (Johnny Cash)
14 Southern Accents (Johnny Cash)
15 Memories Are Made of This (Johnny Cash)
16 talk (Johnny Cash)
17 Ring of Fire (Johnny Cash)
18 talk (Johnny Cash)
19 I Walk the Line (Johnny Cash)
20 talk (Johnny Cash)
21 Jesus in My Soul (Earl Ball with Johnny Cash)
22 talk (Johnny Cash)
23 Jackson (Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash)
24 If I Were a Carpenter (Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash)
25 talk (June Carter Cash)
26 Wabash Cannonball (June Carter Cash)
27 talk (June Carter Cash)
28 Wildwood Flower (June Carter Cash)
29 talk (June Carter Cash)
30 I Used to Be Somebody (June Carter Cash)
31 talk (June Carter Cash)
32 Will the Circle Be Unbroken (June Carter Cash)
33 Big River (Johnny Cash)
34 I Still Miss Someone (Johnny Cash)
35 Orange Blossom Special (Johnny Cash)
36 I'll Be Waiting (Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash)

https://www.imagenetz.de/kx4Zz

I couldn't find any photos of Cash at this exact concert. But I did find a good one of him playing at the House of Blues in 1996, so I used that. Tom Petty was standing to his side, but I had to crop him out of the photo since he wasn't part of this concert. I hope whatever live recordings there are of Cash and Petty playing together get officially released someday.