The Man In Black - Full Circle

Remember when you were a kid, how you didn't like any of the music your parents listened to? Worse yet, your grandparents? My grandmother on my mother's side and her brother liked Johnny Cash, Roy Clark, Buck Owens and other artists of that era. My mother was a Statler Brother's fan. I can't make fun of Still A Dad's tastes because he had The Door's, ELP and other albums I would listen to. If we all happened to be at my grandmother's house or home watching TV and Johnny Cash would come on - we'd giggle and make fun. When you're 12 and listening to Kiss and Aerosmith, it's hard to appreciate Johnny Cash. As you get older and learn about the history of music, it's easier to appreciate what people like Cash and Elvis Presley did. I still never bought a Cash recording - but at least I respected what he did. I'm like that with The Beatles as well. I love music but I've never really been drawn to anything The Beatle's ever recorded. It's just a personal preference. It's why I own every Zeppelin CD yet never bought a single Rolling Stones recording. Since Still A Dog turned me on to the blues 10 years ago and I've gone back and bought CDs of the blue's masters before a guitar was ever plugged in - I can appreciate more what these early artists did. I watched the movie "Walk The Line" twice since it debuted on cable and I love it. Even though Cash was a joke to me when I was young, I can see now that he was a rebel back then. What's hilarious about people like Cash and Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings is that they were drugged up just as much or MORE than today's artists. My grandmother to this day would equate someone that takes one hit off of a joint to an addict laying in a alley somewhere. I think they are clueless as to some of these artist's pasts. They may only know the Cash that turned to Jesus and showed up regularly on TV singing gospel. They wouldn't believe you if you told them Willie Nelson smokes more pot than Snoop Dogg and Bhusta Ryhmes combined.....still. Anyway, I knew Cash covered a NIN song and a Soundgarden song on one of his last CDs. I found the video he did for Hurt originally recorded by Nine Inch Nails. It's fantastic. I may actually go out to iTunes today and download 5-10 Cash songs, Hurt included. Cash isn't the only person that fits this paradigm for me, but I have gone from considering him a joke and only for 'old' people, to respecting him from afar, to being a little more curious about him, to actually liking him as an artist. Is that maturity....or am I just now old myself?