The 2008 Legacy Edition, which released both concerts complete, added another dimension to the album’s legacy. Hearing the full arc of both shows — the opening by Carl Perkins, the Statler Brothers’ set, the full performances in sequence — provides context for the official album that changes how it sounds. The selection and sequencing that Johnston made for the original LP were excellent; the decisions that cut the comedy songs short and placed the stronger performances in sequence were the right decisions for a commercial record. But the full performances show the room, show the relationship between Cash and his audience, show the texture of an event that was more than any single LP could contain.
Robert Hilburn, the Los Angeles Times music critic who was present at the January 13 concerts, documented the event in writing that contributed to the album’s liner notes. His presence at the recording was itself significant — the involvement of a major newspaper’s music critic at a prison concert recording in 1968 was not an obvious assignment, and his coverage helped establish the album as a cultural event rather than merely a commercial release.
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## Cash as Advocate
The question of what At Folsom Prison meant in terms of prison advocacy requires some care.
Cash had been performing at prisons since 1957, beginning at Huntsville State Prison in Texas. His motivation, by his own account, was partly humanitarian — a genuine feeling of connection to incarcerated people — and partly practical: he had found that prison audiences were among the most responsive he had ever played for. The connection was real, whatever its sources.