Published March 28, 2003, in the Kansas State Collegian

Review by Matthew Webber

When you hear Johnny Cash's cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" -- and especially when you see the video -- you can't deny it: Cash sounds and looks like he is dying. The man who once sang that he shot a man in Reno just to watch him die is near death, and we, unwittingly, have to watch.

When Cash sings, "Everyone I know goes away in the end," I realize I don't want "to have it all;" I don't want his "empire of dirt." Although the raw pain of "Hurt" was already beautiful to hear, Cash's version becomes even more poignant because of its admittance and acceptance of fate.

Cash's newest album, "American IV: The Man Comes Around," might serve as his last will and testament. It already sounds like a requiem for himself or the Book of Revelations with acoustic guitar.

The album's sepulchral tone is unique to popular music. Cash and gangsta rappers have long sung of capping people; it's harder to recall an artist singing about aging, infirmity and mortality with such candor.

His gravelly voice, which has never been lower or grittier, also sounds alive. If Cash has embraced his end, he's also fighting it. He's going down, guns blazing, aiming to take you with him.

"I killed a man they said," he sings in "Sam Hall." "And I smashed in his head/And I left him laying dead/Damn his eyes!"

Oops! In "I Hung My Head," he did it again, this time unintentionally. He shot a man, but he didn't mean to pull the trigger. He was practicing his aim when the gun went off. He's not that innocent.

Cash has never been more relevant or hip. Rick Rubin produced "The Man Comes Around," as he has the other albums in the "American" series. The album features more guest appearances than a P. Diddy remix: Fiona Apple, Don Henley, Nick Cave, Randy Scruggs and Heartbreakers Benmont Tench and Mike Campbell sing or play on various tracks.

The covers could sound gimmicky, if they weren't sung and played with such somber respect. Cash's favorite themes have always been love, God and murder, so it's hard to distinguish "Bridge Over Troubled Water," "Personal Jesus," "Danny Boy," "Desperado" and the Beatles' "In My Life" from Cash's originals.

He ends the album with "We'll Meet Again," which here sounds like a eulogy: "We'll meet again/Don't know where/Don't know when/But I know we'll meet again/Some sunny day."

I hope the Man in Black will live to record another "American" album, but I'm already wearing black in mourning.