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35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The REAL Johnny and June Story , February 27, 2006
This excellent collection is, amazingly, the very first "best of" collection of the legendary country duet Johnny Cash and June Carter. Spanning the years 1964 to 1980, the album features seven of their eight singles (curiously missing "If I Had a Hammer") as well as many rare duet tracks from Cash solo albums. Although the couple sang together for 35 years, they actually recorded surprisingly few songs together despite being one of country music's most popular and famous duets. The songs are (with noting of chart peak of the actual hits)
1. It Ain't Me Babe(#4)
2. Jackson (#2, Grammy winning performance)
3. Long-Legged Guitar Pickin' Man (#6)
4. Oh What A Good Thing We Had
5. Darlin' Companion
6. If I Were a Carpenter (#2, Grammy winning performance)
7. 'Cause I Love You
8. The Loving Gift (#27)
9. Help Me Make it Through the Night
10. The Pine Tree
11. No Need to Worry (#15)
12. Old Time Feeling (#26)
13. One Way Rider
14. Brand New Dance
15. Far Side Banks of Jordan
16. It Takes One to Know One
Songwriters whose works are performed include Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson, Billy Edd Wheeler, Waylon Jennings, Rodney Crowell, Carlene Carter, and Johnny and June themselves.
This is true blue mainstream country music, not rock n'roll, not folk, and the Cashs are masters of the art. Their Grammy-winning classics "Jackson" and "If I Were a Carpenter" are naturally here as the hilariously sassy "Long Legged Guitar Pickin' Man". They do a fine cover of "Help Me Make it Through the Night" turning that song about sex into a song about love and co-wrote the bittersweet saga of faded love in "Oh, What a Good Thing We Had". This collection shows a quite versatile team going from hilarious comic numbers to unforgettable sagas of love and memories.
All of the performances are fine but the jewel of the collection is the deeply moving "The Loving Gift" by Kristofferson. This delicate tender song is about as fine an example of a perfect country love song as you can find and I believe it's the best thing the duo ever did. It had the misfortunate of being released as a single when lurid sex songs like "You've Never Been This Far Before" were the rage on country radio and this tale of true love didn't quite fit in and was only a minor hit for them but it's a musical masterpiece.
The duets with June were the Man in Black's ventures into Technicolor, love, and beauty. Johnny Cash always seems far happier when June was by his side (check out that beaming cover photo). Their love is all over the performances here.
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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Long Overdue Collection of Johnny and June's best duet work, March 18, 2006
The recent success of the film Walk The Line has spawned numerous - mostly redundant - Johnny Cash solo collections. Surprisingly, this is the first attempt at compiling Johnny and June's best duet recordings and only their second fully collaborative cd (the first, a reissue of their 1967 album Carryin' On, collects the first four tracks included here).
16 Biggest Hits captures most of Johnny and June's duet singles, with their top 30 rendition of "If I Were A Hammer" strangely omitted. Their early recordings were characterized by playful banter, be it humorous ("It Ain't Me Babe," "Long-Legged Guitar Pickin' Man") or flirtatious ("Jackson"). With their marriage in 1968, there was a shift toward songs of devotion to each other ("If I Were A Carpenter," "The Loving Gift," "The Pine Tree"), and later on, God ("No Need To Worry," "Far Side Banks Of Jordan").
Eleven of these tracks were recorded between 1969 and 1977, when duets between two established solo artists were the rage (think Conway and Loretta, Porter and Dolly, George and Tammy). This collection shows that Johnny and June at their best were the equal of any of those other more prolific country tandems, ultimately creating a harmonious bond on and off record.
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12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Some GREAT Tunes, Some So-So, Bare Bones Packaging but Still a Good Duets Collection of Johnny and June, May 9, 2006
JOHNNY CASH & JUNE CARTER CASH: 16 BIGGEST HITS is a decent collection of songs, some are excellent, some are just okay. If the song list looks interesting to you, then you will probably enjoy this CD. This record company has a whole line of 16 BIGGEST HITS that they do for many of their artists, so this is the one for Johnny and June.
"Jackson" and "If I Were a Carpenter" are probably the biggest hits. "Long-Legged Guitar Picking Man" is similar to "Jackson" in how the lyrics have the two singers teasing each other for laughs. "Long-Legged..." is also the only time that the real Johnny and June are heard in the movie WALK THE LINE, as the final credits roll at the end of the film. "Far Side Banks of Jordan" is a nice, spiritual tune, not really Gospel, but it was quoted by Rosanne Cash at the funeral for June Carter Cash, and has very touching lyrical content about being reunited with loved ones after death. "The Pine Tree" and "Brand New Dance" are great songs which I never heard before getting this CD. "It Ain't Me, Babe" is also another famous song, but I kind of think the version from the film, sung by Joachin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon, gives this song some stiff competition as to which sounds better.
There are a few songs that don't measure up to the rest, but the good ones can keep me listening for at least half of this CD, and then I might as well just let the whole thing play.
This CD is 45 minutes long, and the songs range in length from 2:15 to 3:35 minutes. The songs were recorded between 1964 and 1983.
It seems that the record company didn't do anything special for this CD release. The packaging is nowhere near as nice as many other Johnny Cash CDs, like his reissued, live, prison concerts, AT FOLSOM PRISON and AT SAN QUENTIN, or his earlier Columbia CDs like SONGS OF OUR SOIL and THE FABULOUS JOHNNY CASH.
The photo on the cover is the only photo, and the CD "booklet" only tells the song list with a few details of each song, like duration, writer, recording date, and when it was originally released. There are no liner notes to read like an essay about the CD, as appears in the other CDs I've already mentioned, which is a let down.
The WALK THE LINE SOUNDTRACK from the movie is pretty entertaining, if you enjoyed the music from the film, then you will pleased with that CD! But if you're like me, you will get the Soundtrack CD first, then get curious about what the original, REAL THING sounded like in the first place, which is why I have been buying Johnny Cash CDs lately.
If you are new to Johnny Cash, like I pretty much was before I saw the WALK THE LINE movie, then I would suggest that you start your Johnny Cash collection with THE LEGEND OF JOHNNY CASH, which has been incredibly remastered with super clear sound, especially for his 1950s hits, and comes with a nice CD booklet. But THE LEGEND does not focus much on the duets with June, so if its the June Carter duets that you are interested in, then this 16 BIGGEST HITS is definitely the way to go, as far as I know.
Johnny also did a lot of Gospel projects. GOSPEL GLORY is my favorite CD of Gospel tunes by Johnny, with guest appearances by June, the Carter Family, and many great, classic, traditional songs.
The DVD movie GOSPEL ROAD is great, and has Johnny narrating the story of Jesus, with Johnny appearing onscreen every ten minutes or so, and including a great cameo performance of Mary Magdalene by June Carter Cash herself--a true labor of love from the early 1970s.
My favorite project by Johnny Cash is his spoken word reading of the entire NEW TESTAMENT of the Holy Bible, which is affordably priced for a 16 CD set, check it out!
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~ Johnny Cash
~ Johnny Cash
~ June Carter Cash
~ Joaquin Phoenix
~ Johnny Cash
by Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash 
