The “gutless” radio stations that banned one Johnny Cash album
Back in the glorious days before music streaming came along, it was the radio setting the trends in rock and roll, making stars out of some and cult heroes out of others. The only issue seemed to be that stations typically had to bow down to their sponsors, which meant avoiding any potentially controversial tracks, much to the chagrin of an artist like Johnny Cash.
Particularly by the standards of country music, Johnny Cash was never overly controversial in his musical material, although the same cannot be said for his offstage antics. A regular feature in the tabloids throughout his 1960s heyday, the ‘Man in Black’ was plagued by a dependency on drugs and alcohol which threatened to disrupt his music career. Even in spite of that darkness, though, Cash never stopped standing up for the voiceless.
For his 20th studio album – Bitter Tears: Ballads of the American Indian – back in 1964, for example, Cash used his platform to bring attention to the historic struggles and lasting hardships of America’s indigenous population. At the time, the songwriter believed himself to have Cherokee blood but, even though that was eventually disproved, it didn’t stop the intensity of his activism.
It is worth remembering that, at that point during the mid-1960s, while civil rights struggles for black Americans waged on, and the women of America were also pushing for a greater degree of equality in society, the plight of First Nations in America were being routinely ignored. After having their land stripped away, their way of life completely destroyed, and many of their ancestors massacred, Native Americans were largely living on dilapidated reservations, being repeatedly attacked by consecutive government administrations.
Witnessing these grave injustices, Cash used Bitter Tears to bring widespread attention both to the essential contributions of Native Americans to the fabric of American society and the horrific treatment they continued to face. Yet, despite the songwriter’s cultural relevance arguably being at its peak at the time that the album hit the airwaves, it failed to make much of an impact initially, given that the radio stations of America had chosen to ignore it en masse.
Whether those stations were attempting to avoid potential controversy in order to appease their sponsors, harboured genuine resentment against First Nations, or just generally didn’t like the album, Cash was not happy. In response, he took out a full-page ad in Billboard magazine, directly calling out radio stations and their managers for burying their heads in the sand. “D.J.s – station managers – owners, etc, where are your guts?” the ad asked.
“I think that you do have ‘guts’,” Cash continued, not pulling any punches. “That you believe in something deep down. Classify me, categorize me – STIFLE me, but it won’t work. […] This ad (go ahead and call it that) costs like hell. Would you, or those pulling the strings for you, go to the [mic] with a new approach? That is, listen again to the record?”
Seemingly, Cash’s only demand was that people actually listen to the record they were panning. “I won’t ask you to cram it down their throats,” he wrote. “But as an American who is almost a half-breed Cherokee-Mohawk (and who knows what else?), I had to fight back when I realized that so many stations are afraid of ‘Ira Hayes’. Just one question: WHY???”
Radio stations didn’t overtly respond to Cash’s demands, but it is worth noting that within a few weeks, the album’s stunning lead single, ‘The Ballad of Ira Hayes’ reached number three on the US country charts and, it is fair to say, the radio stations never messed with Johnny Cash again.
