The Man Who Carried Cash: Saul Holiff, Johnny Cash, and the Making of an American Icon Academic approaches to the less romantic, largely tactical side of making it in the music biz can be snoozy to even the most interested parties. While Julie Chadwick’s look at the relationship between Johnny Cash and his manager Saul Holiff can feel encyclopedic at times, it is mostly an intimate look into one of America’s most important musical figures only made possible after Holiff’s death, when his son found a key to a storage locker where Dad kept sorta-creepy records of his relationship with the singer. Hotliff — who in 1973 abruptly quit working with the Man In Black after 13 years — was there for so many of the ups and downs of Cash’s career, and a trip with this book feels like a criminally detailed peek into a very complex relationship. (Dundurn Press)
This article appears in Dec 21-28, 2017.
