In January 1968, Johnny Cash and the Tennessee Three, The Carter Family, The Statler Brothers and Carl Perkins recorded a concert inside California's Folsom Prison. To commemorate this historic show, 40 years later, STRICTLY CASH performed inside Mountjoy Prison, Dublin.
The following year, they recreated the famous San Quentin concert at a show in Cork's Crane Lane Theatre. Sadly, the original show in 1969 did not feature Luther Perkins, who had died in a house fire the previous Summer.
On stage at Mountjoy Prison, 2008.
The poster for the STRICTLY CASH San Quentin show at Cork's Crane Lane Theatre, 2009.
Barry wrote this song for the show in Mountjoy, but also as a tribute to the prison songs written and sung by Johnny Cash.
As in San Quentin, the Mountjoy audience demanded that the song be repeated, and, let's face it, who was going to argue?
It was performed a third time to close the show.
MOUNTJOY
In a world of steel and stone
In a place I call my home,
On a cold hard slab of concrete where I lie,
When I hear them close that gate
All I ever do is hate
Every moment that I spend here in Mountjoy.
It hurts to realise
That there's another world outside
When I hear the trains and sirens passing by.
If I listen I can count
Every score in Dalymount
But I never get to see them in Mountjoy.
They tell us when to eat
When to wake and when to sleep.
They'll teach me right from wrong before I die.
While I'm incarcerated
In this hell that man's created
I'm being rehabilitated in Mountjoy.
So what's it all about.
Will I have changed when I get out?
Will I gain from all the years that have passed me by?
Will I be a better man,
Will I do the best I can,
Am I part of some great plan, in Mountjoy.
phone (353) 86 1957449 email strictlycash@eircom.net