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Manic Street Preacher: Neil Diamond gets evangelical on ‘The Johnny Cash Show,’ 1970


Neil Diamond and Johnny Cash.
 
One of Brooklyn’s finest, Neil Diamond, was 29 when he joined one of his heroes, 38-year old Johnny Cash on Cash’s short-lived variety program The Johnny Cash Show, which aired on February 7th, 1970.

After leaving Brooklyn for a short stint (Diamond’s father Kieve was in the military), the family ended up in Cheyenne, Wyoming where Neil would discover “singing cowboy” movies, exposing the young Diamond to the genre of country music. Later when the family returned to Brooklyn, Neil’s folks gave him an inexpensive acoustic guitar for his birthday. Diamond was already performing with his high school chorus along with another Brooklyn native, Barbra Streisand. A talented fencer, Diamond’s swordplay (not with Babs) got him a college scholarship where he would enroll as a pre-med student. Though “Dr. Neil Diamond” has a nice ring to it, Diamond, already a rabid songwriter, succumbed to his passion for music and dropped out to make it as a musician.

When Diamond appeared on The Johnny Cash Show, he was basking in the glow of his success as a songwriter and a solo artist. In 1966 he penned the monster hit “I’m a Believer” for The Monkees and also had a smash of his own the same year with “Solitary Man.” Interesting Cash/Diamond side note; 34 years later, Johnny Cash would cover “Solitary Man” on his deeply moving album, American III: Solitary Man. For Cash’s show, Diamond chose to perform a gospel-inspired number called “Brother Love’s Travelling Salvation Show” from his 1969 album of the same name. The invigorating single irritated evangelical southerners, due to Diamond’s twist of recording and performing it in the style of a proselytizing evangelical preacher. At one point during the three-minute jam, Diamond does, in fact, deliver the song’s lyrics with some preacher-on-the-pulpit fire and brimstone. I’m sure at this point you may be wondering how this went over with Johnny, a religious man to say the least. Well, he loved Diamond and considered him, as we all should, one of the era’s greatest songwriters and performers.

I can’t imagine anyone not being a fan of Neil Diamond, and even if you think you aren’t, just try to NOT sing along to “Sweet Caroline” the next time you hear it. Diamond was recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and in January of this year, he announced he would be retiring from touring. This did not stop the 77-year-old Diamond from putting on a special show (which you can see here), this past Saturday for firefighters battling the horrific Lake Christine blaze in Colorado which has been burning for almost four weeks.

I’ve posted footage of Diamond’s appearance on The Johnny Cash Show below which includes a short interview segment between the pair of musical gods. Now, go turn on your heartlight, then turn this one up.
 

Neil Diamond and Johnny Cash chatting on the set of ‘The Johnny Cash Show’ in 1970.
 

Neil Diamond joins Johnny Cash on ‘The Johnny Cash Show.’ The show originally aired on February 7th, 1970.

Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Thunderball’ opening credits with the theme song that Johnny Cash submitted
How Johnny Cash was nearly killed by an ostrich in 1981
New black tarantula spider species discovered near Folsom Prison is named after Johnny Cash
‘The Pot Smoker’s Song’: Neil Diamond’s terrible anti-weed anthem
Neil Diamond fans, this excellent BBC ‘In Concert’ show from 1971 is a must-see

Posted by Cherrybomb
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08.01.2018
08:48 am
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‘The Pot Smoker’s Song’: Neil Diamond’s terrible anti-weed anthem
05.14.2015
08:54 am
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There’s no shortage of candidates, but my vote for the worst song in Neil Diamond’s catalog goes to “The Pot Smoker’s Song” from 1968’s Velvet Gloves and Spit. While it’s possible to write a decent anti-pot song—Jonathan Richman’s “I’m Straight” comes to mind—it seems Diamond’s ruthless songwriting instincts, so adroit with other kinds of subject matter, led him to adopt the most hysterical position on cannabis: smoking grass leads directly to shooting scag. (As readers of the stoner bible Newsweek know, it does not.)

In ‘68, says Laura Jackson’s Neil Diamond: His Life, His Music, His Passion, the Jazz Singer’s visits to an NYC rehab called Phoenix House inspired him to start an anti-drug group called Musicians Against Drugs (MAD). The organization soon changed its name to Performers Against Drugs (PAD), though I’m not sure it’s a better acronym for an anti-drug group—doesn’t it make you think “crash pad”? Anyway, the crystallization of that late-60s drug activism is “The Pot Smoker’s Song,” an album track which combines grim field recordings with a jolly chorus. During the verses, actual junkies from Phoenix House talk about how grass made drug fiends of them and ruined their lives, accompanied by merry instrumentation and backing vocals. (I think this is how Neil Diamond does sardonic?) See if you can come up with a melody for the first verse:

I started when I was thirteen, and, uh, I had saw some people smoking pot, and I bought myself a nickel bag, and I went behind my building and sat on a bench all by myself, and I smoked that bag—y’know, until I finally got high. Uh, I started with pot ‘cause I was curious, and at that time I was having problems with my family. I remember on one trip, I was at a party, and, uh, I got very sick from, uh, from speed, from meth. And, uh, I used to shoot it in my spine. I also used to shoot acid in my spine. And, uh, I had too much, I was building a big thing up over a week, and I got sick, and I tried to commit suicide.

Jackson’s bio reports the song was subject to such derision that it was omitted from later pressings of Velvet Gloves and Spit. I see no evidence of this on Discogs, but the song was left off of one UK pressing. Never mind: “The Pot Smoker’s Song” was lame. Neil said:

“The Pot Smoker’s Song” almost cost me my career. People just laughed at it.

 

 
But in the fullness of time, the scales fell from Diamond’s eyes and he repented of his error. Ben Fong-Torres’ classic piece “The Importance of Being Neil Diamond,” from the September 23, 1976 issue of Rolling Stone, opens with a 50-man squad from LAPD and the LA Sheriff’s Department raiding Diamond’s house on a cocaine tip. The Man didn’t find any coke at Neil’s place, but the search did turn up a little herb. Fong-Torres knew Velvet Gloves and Spit, and he nailed Diamond:

There is a track on a 1970 [sic] Neil Diamond album called “The Pot Smoker’s Song.” It begins, “Pot, pot, gimme some pot, forget what you are, you can be what you’re not, high, high, I wanna get high, never give it up if you give it a try.” And between the bouncy choruses are spoken testimonials from kids connecting grass to speed, acid, suicide and worse.

Today, Diamond says “The Pot Smoker’s Song” was “essentially misdirected”; that he learned the real villain is heroin after “The Pot Smoker’s Song” came out. He started smoking dope – “mostly out of boredom,” usually on long road trips.

“Fortunately, when I went through this stage,” he adds, “I was old enough to discern between marijuana and heroin.” Diamond is 35.

Fortunately? I, for one, would really have enjoyed hearing the results of a scag habit on Diamond’s later work, but I guess my loss is his gain. It’s never too late to start, Neil…

Posted by Oliver Hall
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05.14.2015
08:54 am
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Neil Diamond fans, this excellent BBC ‘In Concert’ show from 1971 is a must-see
11.11.2014
11:10 am
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We’ve posted several vintage 70s BBC In Concert programs on the blog, wonderfully intimate performances featuring the likes of Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens, Neil Young, Carole King, James Taylor, The Carpenters, David Crosby and Graham Nash taped in front of small studio audiences at the old BBC Television Centre in London. With each of the artists they featured, the BBC sets are probably the very best records we have of these performers in their youthful prime. That would most certainly seem to the case with Neil Diamond’s set for the series. It smokes.

Admittedly I’m not all that big on Neil Diamond after his early years—he loses me pretty fast by the time he’s in his “hairy chest and glittery open shirt live at the Greek Theatre” phase, plus he and Billy Joel practically invented MOR—but when it comes to the first hits he racked up in the earlier part of his performing career, numbers like “Solitary Man,” “Cherry, Cherry,” “Sweet Caroline,” “Shilo,” “Cracklin’ Rosie,” “Song Sung Blue,” “I Am…I Said,” “Kentucky Woman”—well, the man could do no wrong. He wrote “I’m a Believer” for chrissakes! I love Neil Diamond, but it’s a pretty specific sliver of his six decade career that I love.
 

 
So basically I only have two pre-1972 Neil Diamond CDs—this one and this one, to be exact—but believe me when I tell you that they’re never far from the speed rack or out of the car.

This is, in my opinion at least, when Diamond was at his peak. The show is seriously rad, dad and features a set list comprised of “Sweet Caroline,” “Solitary Man,” “Cracklin’ Rosie,” “Done Too Soon,” a killer recital of “A Modern Day Version Of Love” at 16:22, “He Ain’t Heavy He’s My Brother,” “Holly Holy,” “I Am I Said” and rounding out with a rousing “Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show” with its revival tent rap.

A better selection of Neil Diamond performances you simply could not ask for. Turn it up loud.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
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11.11.2014
11:10 am
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Kid band does killer punk version of Neil Diamond’s ‘Cherry Cherry’
01.24.2013
02:44 am
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Happy birthday Neil Diamond!

Eleven-year-old Dante Vessio and his 15-year-old sister Misia cover Neil Diamond’s “Cherry Cherry” proving that great songs never die, they live on in all kinds of interesting permutations. I’m sure Neil would approve.

The two Vessios, band name Vessio, attribute their style to the musical influences of Howlin’ Wolf, Lightnin’ Hopkins and The Troggs, among others. No shit. Cool.

Turn it the fuck up!
 

Posted by Marc Campbell
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01.24.2013
02:44 am
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