The Hurt of Johnny Cash

I've wanted to create this juxta for a while now, but school has kept me uber-busy with projects. Johnny Cash died on Sept. 12, 2003, and it was my intention to post something on him around the anniversary of his death. I've finally found the time to pay a small tribute to this legend of music.

Johnny Cash was one of the most popular country musicians of his generation. He remained popular into the late 1990's before his death. One of the reasons was that he was able to take a contemporary song and give it his own Johnny Cash touch. Johnny Cash recorded Hurt in 2002 and is one of the examples heard here. The first time I heard him sing this Nine Inch Nails song, I was blown away.

I recalled the original NIN version from the album The Downward Spiral from my rock and roll youth. For me, the song speaks to the excesses of a lifestyle that will ultimately kill you. When you hear Cash play this song in his own way, I can feel the actual 'hurt' coming through in his voice. Whereas with NIN version, I feel that maybe his remorse has come too late and I have less sympathy for that. Here's the NIN version of the same song in its original form.

Both versions are performed equally as brilliant, but it's strange how I feel more sympathy for Cash who is aged and has not denied his own excesses in life. In the NIN version of the same song, I come away more with a feeling that the poor choices made in youth are maybe their own fault. I think I came across Cash's version of this song after his death. Knowing that Cash died within five months of his wife, June Carter Cash, made this song more poignant.

Cash had taken on other contemporary songs as well. Two standouts for me were a tune by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and the song Rusty Cage from a grunge band called Soundgarden. Cash received many accolades for his portrayal of Hurt and it stands as one of his final testaments to a man who is living his final years.

Feel free to disagree with me entirely.