Hurt (song)

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Hurt
Image:NIN Hurt.jpg
Single by Nine Inch Nails
from the album The Downward Spiral
Released	1995
Format	Promotional CD
Recorded	Le Pig, Record Plant Studios, A&M Studios
Genre	Industrial rock
Length	25 min 50 s
Label	Nothing Records, Interscope
Producer(s)	Trent Reznor
Chart positions
#8 (Modern Rock Tracks)
Nine Inch Nails singles chronology
"Closer to God" (1994)	"Hurt" (1995)	""The Perfect Drug" Versions" (1997)

"Hurt" is a promotional single from Nine Inch Nails' 1994 album The Downward Spiral. "Hurt" is often hailed as one of Trent Reznor's best, most introspective pieces of songwriting.

In 2002, "Hurt" was covered by Johnny Cash to great critical acclaim; it was Cash's final hit before his death. Its accompanying video, featuring images from Cash's life up to his final months, was named the best video of the year by the Grammy Awards and Country Music Awards. Cash's video was directed by Mark Romanek.

Contents 1 The song 2 Alleged concept 3 The single 3.1 Track listing 4 The video 5 Live performance 6 Johnny Cash's cover 6.1 Reznor's reaction 7 Other versions of the song 8 Sound Clip 9 References 10 External links

The song

"Hurt" is a lament that marks the conclusion to the concept album The Downward Spiral. Next to "A Warm Place", it is the quietest song on the record. The lyrics are sung over a simple guitar melody, synthesizer and subdued industrial background noise, accompanied by piano and drums during the chorus. After the louder second chorus, the song ends in a blast of electronic noise. On the remix album, Further Down the Spiral, it appears in the "quiet" form with no ambience in the background, no silence in the beginning, and the last note of the song is shortened.

Alleged concept

With "Hurt", the story behind the concept album The Downward Spiral is brought to a close. Arguably, the protagonist has already killed himself in the album's penultimate title track and is now reflecting on his life. After his escapades ("broken thoughts I cannot repair") involving drugs ("the needle tears a hole, the old familiar sting"), deceit ("my liar's chair"), self-injury ("I hurt myself today, to see if I still feel", "I focus on the pain, the only thing that's real"), etc, he realizes that all he has gained is ultimately nothing ("I wear this crown of shit", "my empire of dirt"). The person he's singing to, "my sweetest friend", could be referring to the "Piggy" who "left me here I'm all alone", "the reason I stay alive" in "Closer", or 'Annie' who's mentioned in the line "Annie, hold a little tighter, i might just slip away" in "The Becoming". Finally, he speculates whether he would change given another chance.

The single

Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" was never produced as a commercial single for the public. However, a promotional disc was distributed, containing censored ("clean") and uncensored ("soiled") mixes. The disc, Interscope Records PRCD 6179, is labeled "Halo Ten" though it is not considered an official Halo.

Track listing

1. "Hurt" (Quiet Version - Clean) [5:04]
2. "Hurt" (Live Version - Clean) [5:15]
3. "Hurt" (Album Version - Clean) [6:16]
4. "Hurt" (Quiet Version - Soiled) [5:21]
5. "Hurt" (Live Version - Soiled) [5:15]
6. "Hurt" (Album Version - Soiled) [6:15]

The video

The video is a live performance that appears on Closure and the DualDisc re-release of The Downward Spiral. The audio portion appears on the UK version of Further Down the Spiral.

A scrim had been dropped in front of the band on stage, onto which various images were projected. A spotlight was cast on Reznor so he could been seen through the images. Compared to the live renditions performed on future tours, this version most resembles the studio recording with its use of the song's original samples.

There are also official live recordings on And All that Could Have Been and Beside You in Time.

Live performance

During the Dissonance tour in 1995, David Bowie sang "Hurt" duet with Reznor, backed by an original melody and beat. This served as the conclusion to the dual act that began each Bowie set.

Since the 2005-06 Live: With_Teeth tour, NIN has been playing "Hurt" in a more toned-down style, featuring only Reznor on keyboard and vocals until the final chorus, when the rest of the band joins in.

Johnny Cash's cover

Johnny Cash's cover of "Hurt" was released on his 2002 album, American IV: The Man Comes Around. Rick Rubin, producer of Cash's American series and friend of Trent Reznor, suggested the song to Cash. The line "crown of shit" was changed to "crown of thorns", removing profanity and referring to Christ.

The cover was given the Country Music Award for "Single of the Year" in 2003. In 2005, Cash's rendition appeared prominently in television commercials for the fifth season of the F/X television drama, The Shield, as well as being used for one of two tribute videos to Eddie Guerrero that appeared on WWE programming and an episode of Smallville ("Shattered"). It also appeared on the documentary Why We Fight; on British television to play over a concised retrospective video of England's world cup football exit to Portugal in the 2006 FIFA World Cup; as the theme for the annual Australian Rugby League State of Origin competition in 2005; as the background music of a montage (after being played by a prominent character) in the 2004 Irish film Inside I'm Dancing. Futhermore it was used on the free to air television channel of SBS as the background music in advertising prevention of child abuse. Fightstar have been known to cover the song live at concerts, and Garbage used the song as their opening music throughout their Bleed Like Me tour. Sevendust performed a cover of "Hurt" for the Southside Double-Wide: Acoustic Live album, dedicated to Johnny Cash. It has recently been used in a Nike ad in Europe.

Reznor's reaction

In an interview with Alternative Press, Reznor admitted that when Rubin first asked if Cash could cover his song, he was "flattered" but worried that "the idea sounded a bit gimmicky." The power of Cash's cover didn't fully hit Reznor until he saw the video:

“

I pop the video in, and wow… Tears welling, silence, goose-bumps… Wow. I just lost my girlfriend, because that song isn't mine anymore. … It really made me think about how powerful music is as a medium and art form. I wrote some words and music in my bedroom as a way of staying sane, about a bleak and desperate place I was in, totally isolated and alone. [Somehow] that winds up reinterpreted by a music legend from a radically different era/genre and still retains sincerity and meaning—different, but every bit as pure.[1]

”

Reznor still occasionally refers to "Hurt" as "a song that isn't mine anymore." (Rock Sound article transcribed on the NIN Hotline)

Other versions of the song

• "Hurt" has been covered by other artists in addition to Cash, including a live version by Placebo at the (House of Blues, California in 2003), Breaking Benjamin, Fightstar, Anaheim, Matthew Good (acoustic tour 2006), the Razor Skyline, Mike Connolly and Luna Amara. Damien Rice is also known to have inserted lyrics from the song into his live performances.
• Tori Amos frequently sang three or four lines of the song spitefully as an introduction to other songs during her Dew Drop Inn tour in 1996.
• Frank Peterson's musical experiment, "Gregorian", arranged the lyrics into a medieval Gregorian chant.
• Howard Stern had his own version for his show, called "Private Hurt". He played the song while mixing in sound clips from his movie Private Parts.
• Rap group Westside Connection used the repeating guitar melody in Hurt for their song The Gangsta The Killa and The Dope Dealer.
• Sevendust covered this song in their September 12, 2003 gig at the Georgia Theatre in Athens, GA. This was a tribute to Johnny Cash, and thus a cover of a cover, that appears on Southside Double-Wide: Acoustic Live.
• A performance of "Hurt" by Christy Moore (accompanied by Declan Sinnott) appears on the DVD "Christy Moore live in Dublin 2006".
• The verse uses the same chord progressions as The Animals sentinal hit from the 1960's, The House of the Rising Sun
• A rare remix of Johnny Cash' version was released by electronic band, Encoder. The song is featured on their website for free download; http://www.industrialstrengthmusic.com/HURT-EncoderRemix.mp3 .
• There is a version of the song featuring the puppet character Kermit the Frog singing and tossing a picture of Miss Piggy, and it became well-known enough that clips of it were featured on the Canadian television series The Hour, hosted by George Stroumboulopoulos. Stroumboulopoulos speculated that the Kermit version was inspired by the Cash version rather than that of Nine Inch Nails.^[2]

Sound Clip

"Hurt" (help·info) on The Downward Spiral.

References

1. ^ Alternative Press #194. September, 2004
2. ^ The Hour, CBC Television, aired 4 April 2007.

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