Almost a year before his death Johnny Cash at the age of 70 would gain a younger generation
of fans by covering Nine Inch Nails' 1994 song "Hurt". But how did he end up covering
that song? Seems like a strange choice but also a very appropriate song given that time in his
life. What's beautiful about the song is that it takes on an entirely different meaning based on
who's singing it. Trent Reznor's intention was to have the song about a young person spiral
into either self-harm or drug addiction but Cash gives the song a new light. Cash
interpreted the lyrics to be about an older man who knew his life was about to be over.
Prior to recording and releasing Hurt in 2002, Cash of course had a long and storied career.
Born in Arkansas in 1932, he would sign his first major record deal in the mid 50s to
Sun Records and he would soon establish himself as one of the greatest country
and rock singers of all time with classics like "I Walked the Line" and "Ring of Fire".
Johnny Cash was the rock n' roll rebel as he was given the name 'the man in black',
not just because of his fashion but because of his outlaw image.
By the later part of his career in the 70s and 80s, Cash had expanded beyond music appearing
in both television and film. As the 90s began, the music industry saw a dramatic
shift as alternative rock is what the record labels were interested in and while a lot of
alternative bands had their roots in punk, those same artists paid tribute to Cash.
Cash would team up with Nirvana bassist,
Krist Novoselic to do a Willie Nelson tribute album and would also appear on the U2 album,
1993's Zooropa on the song "Wanderer". It was that appearance and his appearance at
a Bob Dylan tribute show in 1992 that got him the attention of big-time producer Rick Rubin.
Rubin, at that point in his career had a record label named American Recordings which used to be
called Def American and he was scouting for acts to add to his growing roster. Rubin felt that Cash
was still an important figure in music who'd been treated unfairly by the industry. Now it seemed
like an odd choice for Reuben's label given his past roster of clients but then again Rubin has
worked with an eclectic group of artists including the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Beastie Boys, Run DMC
and Slayer. Rubin would offer Cash something he offers all his artists, creative freedom.
Here's Cash discussing how he initially first met Rick Rubin
and how he wasn't interested in even speaking with him.
"How did he come, how did he approach you to be on his label?" "I was doing a show in California and
when I came offstage, my manager Lou Robin came to me and said 'there's a man here named Rick
Rubin that said he would like to meet you that has a record company and he would like to record
you' and I said, 'I don't want to meet him', and he said 'yeah, well I think you might like him'.
I said 'why', and he said, 'well he's different, he's not like the rest of them'. So I told him,
bring him back and I went back and there's Rick and immediately I liked him and I said,
'so if you had me on your record label, what would you do that nobody else has done?' and he said,
'what I would do is let you sit down before the microphone with your guitar and sing every song
you want to record, just you and your guitar' and I said 'you're talking about a dream I had
a long time ago to do an album called late and alone' and he said 'that's it' he said that's
the kind of record that we want to make'. Well that was my first American record."
Cash would sign with Rick Rubin's record label but a lot of people upon hearing the news were
confused and even a little weary including Cash's own daughter as exemplified by this interview.
"I'd heard of Slayer before but you know the thing that intrigued me that the man that produced the
rap music and the Chili Peppers and Slayer and all of them was interested in me personally".
"The opportunity of working with someone like him really excited me so I tracked him down and
we spent some time together. I went to see a couple of his
shows and we started hanging out a bit and talking about music."
"Shortly before that, Dad had been asked to do the Lollapalooza tour and I called and said,
'please don't do it dad, just don't don't put yourself in a situation where you're
not gonna get the respect you deserve'. I just couldn't bear to think about him going out and
playing to 14 year olds who didn't know or care who he was. So when I heard about Rick,
I probably definitely had a few of those concerns, like does this guy really get who he is."
"He's given me an opportunity to express myself artistically
that I never had before. I drug out every 'ole song that I ever wanted
to sing and I've sung and it's given me an enthusiasm and a new look at what my
possibilities and capabilities are that I never thought I would get to experience."
"Some of the songs I really didn't understand why he was doing them or why Rick chose them,
that was a matter of getting used to a new Johnny Cash on record."
The first album he would put out on Ruben's label would be called American Recordings
and would see its release in 1994. The album would feature songs written by
Cash himself plus songs by Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen. The album was well received
by critics and would end up earning Cash some of the best reviews of his career.
Cash and Rubin followed up American Recordings with Unchained in 1996 and that album would
feature covers of Beck's Soundgarden and Tom Petty and the album would get a Grammy
nomination for best country album. Unchained in 1996 would be followed up four years later
with 2000 Solitary Man which sought Cash cover U2 song "Won". All the cover songs
Cash recorded would soon pave the way for him covering Nine Inch Nails' single "Hurt".
His final album of his career would be late 2002's, American for the Man Comes Around",
and of course it was Rick Rubin's idea to have Cash cover the Nine Inch Nails track.
Trent Reznor was a personal friend of Rubin so when Rubin asked Reznor if Cash could cover a
song, he said he was both flattered but also skeptical, thinking the idea sounded gimmicky
but Reznor agreed but his opinion on the matter would soon change especially after seeing the
music video and Cash also made some minor changes to the lyrics substituting "crown of thorns"
instead of the original lyrics which had "crown of [shit]". Now "crown of thorns" was used by Nine
Inch Nails in the radio edit of the song. Rubin had previously brought the song to the attention
of Cash but the country singer had trouble understanding the lyrics with Rubin telling
Rolling Stone, "I think it was hard for him to hear so I sent him the lyrics and I said just read
the lyrics if you like the lyrics then you'll find a way to do it that will suit you. Cash trusted
Ruben's insistence to have the song recorded and it was laid down at Rubens house in Los Angeles.
"It's really a very emotional video I mean did you feel very emotional?" "I did,
doing it I felt very emotional doing the 'Hurt' video, yes." "Where did the song come from,
did Rick Rubin play it for you and say 'we're gonna do this song?" "Yeah" "What did you think
when you first heard it?" "Rick played the song for me, when I heard the record I said
I can't do that song, it's not my style. He said, 'well let's try it another way,
let me do something', so he put down a track and I listened to it so we started working on
that. From there, we started working on it until we got the record made."
Now at this point in Cash's life his health was seriously deteriorating and
this affected his voice. Reuben would tell Rolling Stone in the
same interview there were times when his voice sounded broken. He tried to turn
that into a positive in the selection of the music. It was a real struggle for him.
Now the video for the song was also very memorable and was shot on a cold
winter's day in Nashville in February of 2003. It would be movie director,
Mark Romanek who shot the video and his previous credits included artists such as Madonna,
Beck and Lenny Kravitz. Romanek had been begging Rubin for a chance to
work with Johnny Cash for quite a while, Romanek's goal was to capture who Cash was,
splicing images of a young cocky rebel with a frail old man that appeared to be at the end
of his life. A lot of the footage was shot at the House of Cash Museum in Nashville which
by this point in time was in a pretty bad state of disrepair as shown in the video.
The shots of decaying fruit in the museum would serve as a metaphor for Cash's own
health. The building would unfortunately be destroyed in 2007 by an accidental fire.
Now several months after the video was shot, his wife of 35 years, June Carter
Cash passed away and Johnny Cash passed away several months later in September of 2003.
Johnny Cash's final album would prove to be an amazing farewell for the legendary musician as
the album was the first Johnny Cash record to achieve gold in the US in more than three decades
So the question has to be asked, how did Trent Reznor feel about the whole thing
now looking back? Well here's what he had to say about the song. "He called me up and said,
'you know we're doing another record with Johnny and we'd like to do "Hurt",
are you okay with that?' Of course I'm extremely flattered that Johnny Cash, who I consider an
unbelievable songwriter would want to cover one of my songs, yeah of course. I think to justify my
sense of not being that important in my own head, I thought 'well they're probably doing you know 50
cover songs'. We were in the midst of working on something at the same time in New Orleans and then
a couple weeks later a CD shows up in the mail and we listen to it. It was very strange hearing
his giant voice inhabiting a song I wrote, kind of taken over but it was so weird at that moment
that I felt so wrong and I was deep into whatever I was working on at the time compositionally and
I kind of dismissed it. I just wasn't ready to absorb. Briefly after that, the videotape shows
up and it's Mark Romanek's video of the song and when we watched that, that's when the full impact,
it was a real important moment for me. I was feeling pretty insecure about myself and what
I was working on at the time and when that played I thought, what an amazingly powerful thing music
can be. I remember where I was when I wrote those words and how I felt and what a personal intimate
quiet written small in a journal those words were and to hear them juxtaposed against the life of
this icon sung so beautifully and emotionally, it was a very conscious reminder of what a beautiful
medium music is, how transcended and important and just human. I needed that at that time.
That does it for today's video guys thanks for watching be sure to hit the like button and
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send me an email at gnrcentralnews@gmail.com.