JOHNNY CASH - American VI: Ain't No Grave LP

Highly recommended.

Posthumously released albums are often very difficult to judge, because even when they're very enjoyable, they can still be cash grabs by their labels or estates. Even the best posthumous release ever, From a Basement on the Hill, would probably have not been approved by Elliott Smith as it was put together after his death. With Johnny Cash, it's not exactly a reason to get your hopes high, considering that throughout his career, he already had many albums that were shameless cash grabs, with re-recorded songs, or only half the tracklist new material.

On the other hand, you have Rick Rubin taking care of the whole thing, and he was responsible for Cash's comeback and greatest string of albums in his entire career, and the final result is actually quite impressive, and more importantly, incredibly respectful to Cash and his legacy. These songs were recorded not long before his death and so there are two things that are interesting. The first is that it's a very spiritual album, very hopeful and uplifting despite him clearly being aware that he's gonna die very soon.

The second thing is, that his vocals are very fragile, the complete opposite to his "Man in Black" image, but they're just as powerful and even more emotional.