Nathan Kalish never met Johnny Cash. But he’s co-written a song with the late icon — “Delta Woman,” premiering exclusively below, from Kalish’s new album, Songs for Nobody.
Kalish’s connection to Cash came last fall, when he was touring in Sweden and was introduced to a memorabilia collector who specialized in Elvis Presley but had also acquired a cache of Cash items from one of the Man in Black’s Scandinan friends. On the wall, Kalish saw framed copies of handwritten lyrics for songs Cash never recorded.
“They were all in his handwriting, and some of them were pretty hard to read,” he says. “I went back to the place I was staying and finished ‘Delta Woman’ that night, totally based off a Johnny Cash style of guitar playing. I’ve played a lot of Johnny Cash music through the years, so I’m kind of a study in that kind of music. It was fun to finish the song as half my direction, half something I think he would’ve done. I like the idea of writing with other people — especially if it’s Johnny Cash.”
Coming back to the U.S., Kalish, who was living in Nashville at the time, began researching the lyrics to see if they’d ever surfaced in anything Cash had written over the years. He also reached out to John Carter Cash to discuss the track and get permission, but after an initial exchange with Cash’s assistant he never heard back so decided to ahead and record “Delta Woman” for Songs for Nobody and let the proverbial chips fall where they may.
“It’s been confusing, what to do with the whole thing,” says Kalish, who also took photos of the two other song lyric sheets he found in Stockholm. “Instead of publishing the song under his name or under my name, I didn’t publish it at all. I’m not claiming a writer credit for it. I’m letting the narrative speak for itself. I don’t want to make anybody angry. I would’ve given 100 percent of the publishing to Johnny Cash’s estate if they wanted. But at the same time, when you get to do something cool like this, if you don’t do something with it it’s just gonna disappear, and that would just be wrong.”
“Delta Woman” certainly puts a shine on Songs for Nobody, which comes out April 10 and follows up 2018’s I Want to Believe. Kalish self-produced the 10-song set over three days at Trace Horse Studio in Nashville after a misfired attempt to record in Detroit, using players who have worked with Sturgill Simpson, American Aquarium, Drivin N Cryin and others.
“It was more of a country-rock band thing, just everybody in one room playing together — pretty simple, really,” Kalish says. “If you’re living in Nashville and you have a bunch of talented friends and everyone willing to do it, that’s its own aesthetic. It’s a really special way to make a record. You give up a little control that you have when you’ve got click tracks and Auto-Tune, but it’s nice to have a bunch of friends hang out and play music together, and this album] really captures that.”
As Songs for Nobody surfaces, Kalish — whose Nashville apartment was damaged in the March tornado — is laying mostly low in rural western Michigan, where he’s living with a friend who’s a nurse and helping care for her child, dog and home. “I’ve been cooking a lot, taking walks, playing guitar, chopping wood, doing what a lot of people are doing now,” says Kalish, who plans to stream some live performances in support of the album. “I love to cook, so it’s been nice having a good kitchen and all that. It’s rough, but I’m having a relaxing time. There’s so much that’s changing, every day it seems. I’m hoping for the best but trying not to look too far ahead.”
Listen to “Delta Woman” below.
