Track Listing

1. Hurt (Album Version)
2. Personal Jesus (Album Version)
3. Wichita Lineman (Vinyl Version)
4. Hurt (Video)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #93757 in Music
• Released on: 2003-11-03
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Single, Maxi

Customer Reviews

A fine swansong for The Man In Black
Johnny Cash wrote some 103 hits in his 50 plus years as a fully paid-up musician, but it was to be that his rendition of the Nine Inch Nails industrial rock song ‘Hurt’ would be his swansong.

Lifted from his final album ‘The Man Comes Around’, it would be this song that ensures that album’s prominence. Where Trent Reznor’s original was a troubled paean to drug addiction, Cash infuses the track with genuine heart to accompany the bitterness. Cash treats the song with such honesty that adds to what was an already powerful mantra in Reznor’s hands. Frankly it’s the only song of the last decade to move me into an awed silence every single time I hear it.

On the B-Side, you’ll find a trembling re-working of Depeche Mode’s ‘Personal Jesus’ and a breathtaking version of Glen Campbell’s classic ‘Wichita Lineman’. These tracks are good, but totally overawed by the magnificence of ‘Hurt’. Also included on the disc is the heartbreaking video of ‘Hurt’. It was exceptionally touching before his death, now it is truly among the saddest things I have ever seen.

To say that this disc is a fitting tribute to one of the all-time greats is praise indeed. Sometimes five-stars just don’t do a song justice. Rest In Peace Johnny.

Beautiful...
Johnny Cash singles probably shouldn’t be played at lunchtime on Radio 1. This is a world where bouncy, jovial pop tunes do not necessarily sit well with morbid laments by men in their 70s on life and death. But this is where I first heard this haunting, and absolutely amazing song – whilst sat in my car, stuck in traffic, on an incredibly grey, and exceptionally wet day. Mark and Lard are full of surprises.

No doubt the rather grey and cold environment I was in at the time added to the atmosphere, but this song on first hearing just floored me. You know what I mean – it’s the moment when a record can actually stop you dead in your tracks. Repetition hasn’t dented this song, as “Hurt” has since done it to me time and again. It’s just devastating.

Originally written by, of all people, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails (an artist I confess to not having much time for) the song refers to his battle with heroin addiction. It is odd that such a song can have new meaning and resonance when sung by an old man battling illness (Cash has been diagnosed with autonomic neuropathy) and it suddenly takes on so many new dimensions.

Of course we have to say something about The Voice, as this is Johnny Cash. I can’t say I’ve ever been a huge fan, but this weathered, torn but ultimately dignified vocal is a far cry from the booming noise I heard on the old records my Dad plays. Thankfully, with “Hurt” the production is sparse and a tremendous amount has been done with a handful of acoustic guitars and the weariest voice I think I’ve ever heard. It’s a beautiful three and a half minutes, and as the chorus reaches its climax it’s a great moment.

Finally, mention should go to Mark Romanek’s video – which is, thankfully, included here. As you might have heard, people are saying it’s exceptional. They’re right.

Buy the single, buy the album, it doesn’t matter – just hear it.

swan song brilliance
Johny Cash covering a Nine Inch Nails track... it just doesn't seem possible, but what he has achieved with his stripped down version of Hurt is simply brilliant. He has made the song his own, by reflecting through the words and the imagery they convey, the weight of his life. The man was troubled and he has turned Trent's song into a challenging redemptive examination of his life, not misunderstanding the original song as another reviewer has stated, but adding to it the personal torment of his lows and how he crucified his Lord through so many wrong turns and wrong choices. (I'd love to know what Trent thought of this version?)

The mastery of the vocal and stripped down instrumentation give way to the aching coming straight from his heart. This is further enhanced by the video accompanying this single.

Many will see this as the ultimate swan song and wish they had recorded a song of such understated strength and dynamism as their last note to the world.

Johnny, rest in peace - the hurt is now over.