This started as a quick link, but it got too long not to have a title:
I’ve been thinking about Johnny Cash’s performance of “Hurt” for the last couple hours for no particular reason:
I really don’t know what brought this song to mind1, but I finally broke down and watched the video. The video is even more haunting than I remember, especially considering that Cash died shortly after recording it. The Last Supper scene really intrigues me every time I see it: I wonder what other artists trying to pull it off would look like; I suspect not well which begs the question why? I mean what is so different about Cash? For some reason the word “sinner” popped into my head when I typed that but it could just be “Walk the Line’s” influence on me. Maybe it’s because Cash died right after the video, making it prophetic? Who can really say?
I wasn’t really thinking about death, or relationships, but its hard to ignore those topics given the lyrics:
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 hurtIf I could start again
A million miles away
I would keep myself
I would find a way
If we could start again indeed.
- A very different Cash song came up on my music shuffle earlier and I guess that must be the actual catalyst. ↩
The song itself always gets me, the video doubly so.
Yeah, I remember seeing th video for the first time on TV. It was a conversation killer for sure.