Track Listing

1. The Man Comes Around
2. Hurt
3. Give My Love To Rose
4. Bridge Over Troubled Water
5. I Hung My Head
6. First Time Ever I Saw Your Face
7. Personal Jesus
8. In My Life
9. Sam Hall
10. Danny Boy
11. Desperado
12. I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
13. Tear Stained Letter
14. Streets of Laredo
15. We'll Meet Again

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20829 in Music
• Brand: CASH,JOHNNY
• Released on: 2003-03-04
• Number of discs: 2
• Dimensions: .26 pounds

Album Description
Bonus DVD contains the music video for "Hurt", directed my Mark Romanek.

Amazon.com
On first thought, the idea of The Man in Black recording such covers as "Bridge Over Troubled Water," "Danny Boy," and "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" might seem odd, even for an artist who’s been able to put his personal stamp on just about everything. But American IV: The Man Comes Around, which also draws on Cash’s original songs as well as those by Nine Inch Nails ("Hurt"), Sting ("I Hung My Head"), and Depeche Mode ("Personal Jesus"), may be one of the most autobiographical albums of the 70-year old singer-songwriter’s career. Nearly every tune seems chosen to afford the ailing giant of popular music a chance to reflect on his life--and look ahead to what’s around the corner. From the opening track, Cash’s own "The Man Comes Around," filled with frightening images of Armageddon, the album, produced by Rick Rubin, advances a quiet power and pathos, built around spare arrangements and unflinching honesty in performance and subject. In 15 songs, Cash moves through dark, haunted meditations on death and destruction, poignant farewells, testaments to everlasting love, and hopeful salutes to redemption. He sounds as if he means every word, his baritone-bass, frequently frayed and ravaged, taking on a weary beauty. By the time he gets to the Beatles’ "In My Life," you’ll very nearly cry. Go ahead. He sounds as if he’s about to, too. Unforgettable. (This special 2003 version includes a bonus DVD with the music video for "Hurt.") --Alanna Nash

Customer Reviews

Ragged Glory
I don't listen to a whole lot of country music, but when I do I generally like it undistilled. There are a few C&W artists I like without reservations and then there are those who are enigmatic enough that you never know what to expect from them. Johnny Cash fits into both categories.
Cash's "American" series has been interesting and I was eager to hear what was on offer here after his tremendous Solitary Man album. For once, here's an album which lives up to industry hype. I'll be hard pressed to improve on amazon's adulatory paean to Cash's latest work.
I was floored by the ragged glory of Cash's interpretations of this eclectic material the first time I heard it. Very little of it has any connection to traditional country, but with Cash behind the mike, the country just seems to burst forth.
Some of the more familiar songs I heard with new ears. Songs like Hurt, In My Life and Desperado have a whole lot more meaning when sung by a man of Cash's age as he can look back on life's triumphs and disappointments and sound as if he really means what he's singing.
I like the entire CD, but my favorites are the hellfire and brimstone The Man Comes Around, the mournful Hurt, the remorseful I Hung My Head, the reflective In My Life, the swaggering Sam Hall, the plaintive classic Streets of Laredo, and an uplifting rendition of We'll Meet Again.
The video of Hurt is well worth the extra buck fifty. Watch it...again and again and again! Cash's beloved wife appears in it and her recent death gives it a poignancy money couldn't buy.
I agree with the reviewer who said that Johnny Cash is every bit as important to American music as Elvis Presley. In the autumn of his life, he proves with American IV: The Man Comes Around that he still has what it takes to take his place in the pantheon of American music greats

OH MY GOD
I have heard both Trent Reznor's and Johnny Cash's versions of HURT. Trent's version speaks from a young person's point of view and is fine...but in the hands...and voice...and soul of Johnny Cash, it takes on a resonance and meaning that NIN can't even begin to touch. I have seen the video and listened to the song numerous times and I cry every time. It is particularly heart wrenching now that June has passed...Everyone I know goes away in the end...how much more than one man take?

The other songs are good...and the album is superior...but I honestly listen to it for HURT. This album is the crowning touch to a phenomenal career but HURT is the diamond in the crown...his whole life in one song. People need to get over categorizations. This is brilliant MUSIC, no matter what the genre. This is a brilliant musician. He does not have the best singing voice, but his vocals have more soul in them than ANYONE else out there now. I would put him with Billie Holliday when it comes to singing from the very core of being.

Singers like Johnny come our way so infrequently...we need to hold on to him as long as we can.

Hurt
I remember hearing the original version of "Hurt," as played by Nine Inch Nails a while back, but when I heard Cash's version recently on the Top 9 countdown (on the local rock station, mind you), I was BLOWN AWAY. It was always a beautiful and haunting song, but with the wavering voice of a seventy-year-old man singing it, it was amazing, and his version is dark but full of hope.
"If I could start again....." This line of hope nearly made me cry, backed by his progressively louder acoustic playing in the background. Awesome cover, awesome album - HIGHLY recommended.