With a low-pitched voice and sorrowful touched vocals, Johnny Cash was his era’s popular singer and songwriter. He belongs to a poor middle-class family but he became a super celebrity of his time. He started writing songs in the early age of twelve.
While he was a great singer and songwriter Cash was also addicted to drugs specifically amphetamines and barbiturates. Besides the drug addiction, Cash also was addicted to alcohol. Cash took several years to come up with the addiction.
The effects of addiction were also severe and damaged his life, career, relationship, and health. Johnny Cash lost his life due to respiratory failure and diabetes at the age of 71.
Let’s explore his journey of drug addiction and struggle against the addiction.
A Brief Description of Cash’s Life
Carrie Cloveree and Ray Cash welcomed their fourth child in 1932. Although there were six more siblings including Roy, Margaret, Jack, Reba, Joanne, and Tommy.
When he turned the age of three, the family moved to Arkansas. The family had worked in the cotton fields to raise and build the children. He also helped his father work in the field.
With the ups downs and life struggles Cash grew up having a soft corner for the poor. One of the worst incidents of his life that I need to highlight here was the death of his elder brother Jack who was working in the cotton field when he was accidently cut into pieces by the big saw used for cotton cutting.
The incident impacted Cash’s life all over the life and he mentioned often that he would meet his brother in the promised land.
Teenage and Starting a Career as a Musician
Cash was impressed by music from an early age, even after joining military services he learned to play guitars and other instruments. In the early 50s, Cash started writing lyrics and focused on his singing adeptness. After discharging with ethical means he shifted to Tennessee in the year of 1954 to start his musical journey.
Like every start, Cash’s musical journey was also difficult as he began his career as the radio announcer at the local radio channel. At the same time, he began working with Tennessee too, a band that included guitarist Luther Perkins and bass player Marshall Grant.
I highlighted a few of his career struggles, at that time no one knew that in the coming years, Cash would become the greatest music icon in the country music world.
Some Top Hits
I would like to highlight some of his greatest hits with the release year.
| Song title | Releasing year |
| Folsom Prison Blues | 1955 |
| Five Feet High in Rising | 1959 |
| Ring Of Fire | 1963 |
| I walk The Line | 1964 |
| The Ballad of Ira Hayes | 1964 |
| Jackson | 1967 |
| A Boy Named Sue | 1969 |
| Man in Black | 1971 |
| Ragged Old Flag | 1974 |
| Don’t Take Your Guns to Town | 1974 |
| All I Do Is Drive | 1974 |
| One Piece at a Time | 1976 |
| It Ain’t me Baby | 1976 |
| Sunday Morning Coming Down | 1979 |
| Rusty Cage | 1996 |
| Hurt | 2003 |
| Hey Porter | 2019 |
The Bitter Phase of Life
Undoubtfully, Cash was an eminent celebrity. He discovered the music world through his high love and passion with unique styles of folk, ballads, rock, and hymens.
On the other hand, like other music legends, Cash was addicted to drugs and other nostrils. It was the time when he captured the attention of the audience and he was recognized as the biggest name in the music, the year 1957 was when he started to take medications to improve his abilities.
He was supposed to take medication as a mood enhancer which gave him more confidence to show his skills. However, taking more pills made him more addicted to these drugs and the situation worsened in the later years.
Which Drugs Did He Use?
During his peak years of musical career, Cash claimed to drink heavily and was also addicted to the prescribed medicines. The drugs included barbiturates and amphetamines, also Cash was arrested for bringing illegally those drugs to another country. Overall, the addiction impacted badly on his career, relationship, and life in many terms.
What are Barbiturates?
A medication that is used to treat severe disorders of migraines, seizures, and restlessness. However, the medication should be taken as the backup medicine when other common medicines wouldn’t work.
Mostly the medicine is prescribed by the practitioner as a sleeping drug in the condition of epilepsy to become calm. Before times, the drug could be used as an anesthetic medicine, but in recent times other medicines have been invented to do this job more lightly.
The drug can work better with other medicines such as acetaminophen and other common medicines. The drug slows down brain working and affects Gamma-aminobutyric acid in the human brain.
Risks
As we know, addiction is a medical illness that compels the user to take more and more. The higher the dose the higher the chances of being addicted to the drug. It lowers the blood pressure and heart rate of the human body and also blocks the breathing arteries in the respiratory system. It may affect liver function when used excessively.
What are Amphetamines?
Amphetamines with dextroamphetamines applied to tend the central nervous system. The drug is used to treat ADHD and other deep sleep disorders. In some cases, amphetamines are also used to treat diseases such as Parkinson’s disease, narcolepsy, and mood enhancers.
An overdose of the drug can create serious health issues or even death.
He Arrested Several Times in the Name of Drugs
The king of music Johnny Cash, who built records through his success, won multiple awards, and sold almost 90 million records had a terrifying past when it comes to drug addiction. During the period between 1957 to 1969 Cash was arrested several times due to heavy public drinking, smuggling, and foolhardy driving.
In the year 1965, Cash was arrested for smuggling drugs in his musical instrument case and went to prison. The same year Cash also got arrested in the property instance.
He wrote in his biography about the nights that he spent in the prison. One of the interesting reasons for his arrest was once he plucked some flowers from someone’s garden after being heavily drunk.
Drug Addiction’s Impact on His Relationship
Like every aspect of his life, Cash’s relationship with his wife also affected him badly. After a few years of happy marriage Vivian, Cash’s first wife filed for divorce due to the heavy drug addiction and his multiple affairs with other women.
On the other hand, when his first wife filed for divorce Cash’s second wife June Carter who was also a celebrity of her time helped her husband to fight against drug addiction. She used to flush his drug pills and became his supportive partner to get rid of the habit.
According to the biography written by June Carter Cash, Cash was able to fight against the addiction due to June’s love and care.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we can say that,
- Johnny Cash was the great singer and songwriter of his time, who reached the peak of success.
- His notable work includes
- With his other good traits, Cash was severely addicted to drugs specifically barbiturates and amphetamines.
- He was also used to heavy drinking and reckless driving.
- Due to his drug addiction Cash was arrested several times by the police and spent days in jail.
- His habit of using drugs and affair with other women affected his marriage life and his wife filed separation.