I’m in class until this afternoon, so feel free to skip me until I return.

Actually, I choose Johnny Cash “Hurt.”

Write up later. Someone please pm the next guy.

A great song. That's all I'll say.

1979 is a good pick. It definitely captured the teenage life of the late 1990s. Crazy how that world is completely impossible today. I would've probably picked a different Pumpkins video, but only because I forgot about the song.

****

Regarding Vai (and friends, includes Mr S)...

I sometimes wonder if I'm somehow less of a guitarist because I just can't sit through their music for more than a few minutes. There is no doubt that he is talented and there is no doubt he's an amazing thinker, but I just don't enjoy the music much, which includes "For the Love of God..." I just figure they do what they do and I do what I do.

DC11GTR, you must be a hell of a guitarist. Do you happen to have anything on youtube?

I’m retired since about 2006. I screwed my hands up over the years I was touring and the change in the industry made it an impossible career path. No vids unfortunately.

I guess I can appreciate the technical brilliance of the Steve Vai's of the world, but I never want to actually, you know, listen to them.

Round 1, Pick 7 (<======see this guys? it helps the rest of us see exactly where we are! Neat, huh?)



Johnny Cash - Hurt

A devastatingly human meditation on regret and growing old. Director Mark Romanek goes one step further than what producer Rick Rubin had in mind when he suggested Cash sing this Trent Reznor song. Romanek uses old Johnny Cash footage mixed with an old, broken down Cash playing the piano and surrounded by artifacts of his life in the Cash Museum, as he solemnly sings and shakes and yes, even cries.

Wife June Carter Cash stands behind Cash, with a look of love and support and shame and regret that is just heartbreaking in its stark honesty. A year after this video was shot, both June and Johnny would be dead.

The very best music videos add something to the song. The song is great. But the music video turns it into a masterpiece of despair.

In my mind, the very best music video ever made.

*****

Dominic's Videos:

Johnny Cash - Hurt

I really struggle with Johnny Cash's Hurt. I don't think the song is bad per se, but I don't like the song at all. Maybe I have a hard time altering the meaning of a song written by a 20-something to whatever it is that Cash's version is supposed to change it to.

The original is actually a lot of fun to play (well, experiment with) on guitar. The progression, while common, can accidentally trip into a super uplifting piece of music if you aren't careful with it. I think that this thin edge is what makes the song so good: the chorus and outro strongly hints at an uplifting piece of music buried in misery. The Cash version completely demolishes this property, IMO.

Those last 3 notes in NIN's version are exceptional.

Cash is the man. Remake is far superior to the original.

Sounds like Trent was perfectly fine with the cover:

In a recent interview with a British newspaper, Reznor spoke in depth about the Cash version of Hurt:

"I'd been friends with Rick Rubin for several years. He called me to ask how I'd feel if Johnny Cash covered Hurt. I said I'd be very flattered but was given no indication it would actually be recorded.

"Two weeks went by. Then I got a CD in the post. I listened to it and it was very strange. It was this other person inhabiting my most personal song.

"I'd known where I was when I wrote it. I know what I was thinking about. I know how I felt. Hearing it was like someone kissing your girlfriend. It felt invasive".

It was the moving video, though, that made it all fall into place for the Nine Inch Nails star: "It really, really made sense and I thought what a powerful piece of art.

"I never got to meet Johnny but I'm happy I contributed the way I did. It felt like a warm hug. For anyone who hasn't seen it, I highly recommend checking it out. I have goose bumps right now thinking about it.

"Having Johnny Cash, one of the greatest singer-songwriters of all time, want to cover your song, that's something that matters to me. It's not so much what other people think but the fact that this guy felt that it was worthy of interpreting.

"He said afterwards it was a song that sounds like one he would have written in the '60s and that's wonderful".


*****

That's what's special about great songs - their meanings can change depending on who performs them.

I get it, I get it. As I said, the song doesn't work for me. I agree that the video is excellent and makes the song better, and that's only more of an issue. The song becomes something closer to a John Williams piece, where the music isn't able to stand alone.

I think it's cool that Rick Ruben asked permission. It's got to be a huge honor to have anyone of Cash's caliber to cover your work. I'd probably react like Reznor: who can say no to anything he wants to do?

... I'm not Trent Reznor, so his opinion isn't relevant to what I think.

The video works for me.

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No need to go old school and actually read an article on how they made their video when there is a video on how they made their video!

I think Cranberry Tea should be on the clock.

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Isn't herbdizzle up? I'm ready to go, but I don't want to take his spot.

Herbdizzle is skipped...go for it, CT

He posted about four hours ago and then deleted it.

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Walk This Way (Run DMC / Aerosmith)





1986. Aerosmith was a 70's rock band struggling with drug problems and in danger of fading toward irrelevance. Run DMC was a super-cool rap act at its peak that just couldn't break out into the mainstream. Some mad genius out there had the idea to mash the two together and create one of the most influential music videos ever. Walk This Way was the first rap song to crack the top ten charts, and for a lot of people it was a first exposure to the genre.

Afterward, hip-hop quickly exploded onto the mainstream where it's been killing it ever since. As for Aerosmith, they quickly realized that music videos were going to be the next big thing, and the band would stage an epic comeback in the 90's with the album Get a Grip and a whole series of associated music videos that were absolute bangers, such as Cryin', Amazing, Livin on the Edge, etc.

good choice...did you PM Schlitz?

Schlitz is on the clock for two picks!

We will suspend this until the morning, though, so no rush

D'oh, I forgot to pm Schlitz last night, just sent him one.

It should be noted that Run-DMC was originally going to rap over a loop of the opening riff. Rick Ruben had the idea of doing a full-on collab, called up Aerosmith, and the rest is history.

Apparently, Run-DMC regretted doing that song, which I guess gives me permission to dislike the original and the collab.

Dave, what DO you like??!!

Carry on....

lol DaveT's didn't even join the draft but he's got a lot to say about it.

Dave's comments are most welcome, especially since we seem to have stalled.

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Hating on the original Walk This Way has triggered a nerve, it seems.