On January 13, 1968, Johnny Cash walked into California's Folsom State Prison and made popular music history. The choicest cuts from the two shows he recorded that day merged to become At Folsom Prison, a multi-million selling album produced by Bob Johnston that unveiled a startling portrait of American prison life and energized Cash's career. The most popular album of Cash's career to that point, it soared to the top of the charts and paved Cash's way to international stardom.

Available October 14 in this deluxe three-disc edition, are each one of Cash's thirty-six performances from both shows (sixteen of them unissued until now) and the unreleased performances of his road mates Carl Perkins, The Statler Brothers, and June Carter. The definitive versions of Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues," "Cocaine Blues," "Dark As A Dungeon" and other classics crack from the album like shotgun fire, cementing his mythic man-in-black persona and underscoring his rowdy camaraderie with the imprisoned men. Cash also takes on songs new to him such as the country chestnut "I'm Here To Get My Baby Out Of Jail," and "Greystone Chapel," written by Folsom inmate Glen Sherley.

In Folsom's wake, Cash became an international ambassador of country music, prison reform spokesman, and counter-culture hero. Few albums had ever proved so influential. Forty years after its initial release, historians and critics continue to count At Folsom Prison among the classic albums of the 1960s, in a league with Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Pet Sounds, and Blonde on Blonde. As daughter Rosanne Cash observes, Cash went into Folsom Prison and "came into the light."

And coming October 28, Johnny Cash's America.