Lyrics of the Week, 2 August 2015

I used to do this bit back in 2011, but got distracted with other issues. Let's see how it works.

Johnny Cash - Hurt
from "American IV: The Man Comes Around" (2002)
[Originally performed by Nine Inch Nails
on "The Downward Spiral" (1994)]

I hurt myself today
To see if I still feel
I focus on the pain
The only thing that's real

The needle tears a hole
The old familiar sting
Try to kill it all away
But I remember everything

[Chorus]
What have I become
My sweetest friend
Everyone I know
Goes away in the end

And you could have it all
My empire of dirt
I will let you down
I will make you hurt

I wear this crown of thorns
Upon my liars chair
Full of broken thoughts
I cannot repair

Beneath the stains of time
The feelings disappear
You are someone else
I am still right here

[Chorus]

And you could have it all
My empire of dirt
I will let you down
I will make you hurt

If I could start again
A million miles away
I will keep myself
I would find a way

Songwriter: Trent Reznor

Downward Spiral may have been the most important industrial rock album of the 1990s. Taking influences from David Bowie and Pink Floyd, Reznor developed the album while living in the home where Sharon Tate was murdered. He conceived the album as depicting the descent of a character into chaos, addiction and finally suicide. "Hurt" was the final track on the album, somewhat auto-biographical of Reznor and turned out to be the most successful song on the Album.

When Johnny Cash recorded it on "American IV: The Man Comes Around" (2002) he arranged it in a sparing style for his acoustic guitar and piano. His gritty voice and emotional delivery expressed his pain over his own long time addiction to amphetamines. The video which he released with the song was nominated for seven categories at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, capturing one, and won a Grammy in 2004. The video is devastatingly personal, ironic and nihilistic. The old house he is staring into is his childhood home where his family were sharecroppers. Recorded with a sad and sympathetic June Carter in the background, it was released after she died. The album captured the County Music Award for Best Album in 2003.

Johnny Cash Video
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt1Pwfnh5pc>

NIN versions
after Cash
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI7LdCHgLgI>
original
<http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xkp0je_nine-inch-nails-hurt-with-lyrics_music>
& NIN with David Bowie in 1995
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAoLONDAG90>

Have listened to this song many times. Thanks for giving more background. It is emotional and powerful just in the way he sings it.

Yes, he covers it better than NIN. I also think he makes another song on that album "his"

I Won't Back Down

Compare his version to Tom Petty's
It MEANS something with Cash

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8i5NLyXZdc>

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvlTJrNJ5lA>