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Epic Covers

On this morning's Radio 4 broadcast of Desert Island Discs, Alex Salmond's penultimate choice was Johnny Cash's San Quentin. A fine song no doubt, but one limited by time and place and by Cash's personal history, and largely confined to its genre. But then later, while searching for something else, I came across these transcendent covers by Cash, recorded in the last months of his life: the first, one of Gordon Lightfoot's most moving songs If you could read my mind, the second a cover of Hurt by Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails). It's not merely that neither of the original artists is a great vocalist that makes Cash's renditions so much better, for they are both interesting performers, it is that you feel this man giving us in these final songs not just a performance, but his whole life, his flesh, guts and soul. Most of us can only dream of containing a fraction of this visceral humanity, let alone projecting it. Enough said, just watch and listen.




Click here for Hurt

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