When you type “Trent Reznor Hurt” into Google, among the questions that appear in the “People also ask” bar are: “Is Hurt by Johnny Cash or Nine Inch Nails?”, “Who did the original version of Hurt?” and “Is Hurt by Nine Inch Nails a cover?”
Although it is a deeply personal song, “Hurt” has become distanced from its author, Trent Reznor, frontman with the industrial-rock band Nine Inch Nails. Breaking away from its alt-rock origins, “Hurt” has transcended genres, having been reinterpreted for cellists and Gregorian chant. Its varied journey attests to the universality of Reznor’s song.
On April 17 1995, Reznor released “Hurt” as a promotional single. He has described it as “a little poem I wrote in my bedroom”. It was written during a time of intense depression for the singer-songwriter. The house he was renting in LA’s Benedict Canyon had previously been owned by Sharon Tate, a victim of the Manson murders. Reznor noticed the outline of the word “pig” which had been scrawled on the door on the night of the murder and had since been painted over; he named his studio there “Le Pig” after this. He kept the door handle as a memento of his time there, but “Hurt” carries its legacy further.
The opening lines, “I hurt myself today/ to see if I still feel/ I focus on the pain/ the only thing that’s real”, have been interpreted, understandably, as referring to self-harm. The palpable self-loathing in the song is part of a wider theme within Nine Inch Nails’ album from the time, The Downward Spiral: “I’m not proud to say I hate myself and don’t like what I am, but maybe there is real human communication that ends up positive even though everything being said is negative,” Reznor told USA Today in 1994.
Myriad musicians have subsequently recognised that sense of “real human communication”. X-Factor winner Leona Lewis gave a surprisingly moving pop rendition of it at the Royal Variety Show in 2011. In 1995, David Bowie went on tour with Nine Inch Nails, on which Bowie and Reznor performed “Hurt” as a duet.
German producer Frank Peterson, who creates Gregorian chant covers of pop and rock songs, recorded “Hurt” on a 2004 album, The Dark Side. The result is curiously uplifting. Croatian-Slovenian duo 2Cellos recorded a version in 2011 which, though instrumental, retains much of the emotional intensity of the original.
But the most potent and recognisable cover — overtaking even the original in popularity — is Johnny Cash’s, recorded in 2002 for the fourth of his stripped-down American Recordings albums with producer Rick Rubin. Cash may not have written the song (although he swapped Reznor’s “crown of shit” for his own “crown of thorns”), but he sings it with as much conviction as Reznor, adding new depth.
Reznor was initially unsure about Cash covering his song, fearing that it would be “gimmicky”, and he was not blown away when he first heard Cash’s version. But when he saw the video, this changed. With “tears welling, silence, goosebumps”, he recognised its significance.
The video for Cash’s version was directed by Mark Romanek. Aware that he had very little time to shoot, due to Cash’s ill health, Romanek jumped on a flight to Tennessee in search of the perfect location, and found it: the House of Cash museum. “I got the idea that maybe we could be very candid about the state of Johnny’s health, as candid as Johnny has always been in his songs,” he said of his decision to film there, focusing on the decay and the sense of time passing. Cash’s wife, June Carter, also features in the video. She died three months after filming; Cash, some months later. Physical vulnerability is layered over the mental fragility from the original and the impact is immense.
At the end of the video, Cash, silhouetted by a harsh yellow light, closes the lid of the piano and rests his ageing hands on top of it. Reznor’s “valentine to the sufferer” at that point became Cash’s swan song. After watching it, Reznor said: “That song isn’t mine any more.”
What are your memories of ‘Hurt’? Whose version do you prefer? Let us know in the comments section below.
‘The Life of a Song Volume 2: The fascinating stories behind 50 more of the world’s best-loved songs’, edited by David Cheal and Jan Dalley, is published by Brewer’s.
Music credits: Universal-Island Records Ltd.; Nemo Records; Masterworks; Virgin EMI
Picture credit: New York Times/Redux/eyevine