Hurt

(photo by Joel Baldwin)

Songs in Our Heart # 27

Hurt  (Johnny Cash version) (Written by Trent Reznor; released 2002) [The Man in Black’s parting shot, a guilty gift to the world. He had such a great gift for songs of real people in extremis –  Folsom Prison Blues, I Walk the Line, etc. Yet this is a wonderful song per se, originally performed by The Nine Inch Nails, and though Cash loved its anti-drug message, actually, the meaning is so much wider. Note that the original video with the Cash version is worth buying – it wonderfully complements Cash’s great delivery of the tune].

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