Member-only story
This Week’s Rate-A-Record Fell Into a Burning Ring of Fire
And it burns, burns, burns
There are songs that even the most casual listener could immediately identify from the first notes if they showed up as a clue on Jeopardy; “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” “You Shook Me All Night Long,” and “Born to Run” are just a few examples. There are also voices so recognizable that you know the singer instantly; Elvis, Sam Cooke, and Bono are three most everyone would know. For today’s Rate-A-Record, I’ve chosen a song that combines both.
There are some reading this who knew simply from the title of the article that I’m talking about the Johnny Cash smash “Ring of Fire.” The song was written by Johnny’s future wife June Carter and Merle Kilgore and first recorded by her sister Anita as “(Love’s) Ring of Fire” in 1963. Cash recorded his version the same year, adding the Mariachi horns that make the song so instantly identifiable.
“Ring of Fire” became one of Cash’s biggest hits; it spent seven weeks at #1 on the Billboard Country Chart and reached #17 on the Billboard Hot 100. And just like…
