The 2008 Legacy Edition released both concerts complete and unedited for the first time, allowing listeners to hear the difference. The two shows are not dramatically dissimilar in terms of musical execution; the difference is more in feel, in the quality of spontaneity that the morning crowd brought and that the afternoon crowd, having heard many of the same songs performed a few hours earlier, could not quite replicate.
There were other post-production choices. The original LP sequencing was not identical to the performance order. Songs were cut, resequenced, and shaped into a 45-minute album from a performance that ran considerably longer. This is standard practice for live albums, but it is worth noting: what listeners heard on the original release was a selection and a construction, not a pure document. The Legacy Edition corrected this, providing the full performances in sequence.
One other post-production decision became significant for external reasons. The “Folsom Prison Blues” single from the album contained the lyric about shooting a man in Reno just to watch him die. After Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated on June 5, 1968, radio stations began pulling songs that referenced shooting or killing. Columbia Records demanded that Johnston remix the single with that lyric removed.
Cash protested. He objected to the alteration of a lyric he had written and performed without ambiguity. His objection was overruled, and an edited version of the single was released. The edited version reached number one on the Hot Country Singles chart. The irony that the song’s most commercially successful version was the one with the key lyric removed was apparently not lost on Cash.