Though on the surface
Bitter Tears
is just another installment in the seemingly endless series of
Americana
albums that
Johnny Cash
released in the '60s, it was a more daring collection than any of its predecessors or successors. Where
Cash
's previous
albums had previously concentrated on cowboys and Western pioneers,
is all about Native Americans and their trials and tribulations. It isn't a crass move -- it's a sensitive, clear-eyed take on the unfair treatment of the American Indian that uses
traditional folk
ballads
and newly written songs in the same vein. It's stark and moving, his best
album of the '60s. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine