El video de Johnny Cash fue idea de Justin

When Rick Rubin finished producing the final Johnny Cash album, American V: A Hundred Highways, after Cash had passed away, he wasn’t even thinking about making a video for any of the songs. But when Justin Timberlake came along with an exciting idea for the track «God’s Gonna Cut You Down», Rubin took action.

«We were in the studio and we took a break to listen to the new Johnny Cash album, which was not yet released at that point», Rubin told MTV News about when he was recording with Timberlake. «And when we got to that song, [Justin] said, ‘Stop!'» Timberlake then explained a plan for a video to accompany the song, which would feature a series of stars dressed in Cash’s signature black. «And he said, ‘I’m signing up to be the first one’,» Rubin said.

Once Rubin has enlisted director Tony Kaye (American History X), he asked a few friends to make a list of the 10 coolest people on the planet in order to get an idea of who should be in the video. MTV says that 36 stars wound up appearing in the clip, including Iggy Pop, Kanye West, Coldplay‘s Chris Martin, actor Terrence Howard, Anthony Kiedis and Flea from the Chili Peppers, Chris Rock, Kate Moss, Sheryl Crow, Woody Harrelson, Tommy Lee, Keith Richards, Bono, Kid Rock, Jay-Z, Johnny Depp, Patti Smith, Dennis Hopper, Sharon Stone, Lisa Marie Presley, ZZ Top‘s Billy Gibbons, Corinne Bailey Rae, Graham Nash and Beach Boy Brian Wilson. They are all dressed in black of course, and in many cases, the video captures a reflective moment when the participants heard the song for the first time.

«Each person got to design their own moment», Rubin explained. «But Tony was looking more for the instant emotional impact than a pre-planned skit. Nobody was asked to lip-sync, so pretty much everything was spontaneous».