Something I Can Never Have

Album:Pretty Hate Machine

Length:5:55

Tempo:{{{BPM}}} BPM

Versions:Something I Can Never Have (Still)
Something I Can Never Have (Natural Born Killers soundtrack)
Something I Can Never Have (live, Closure)
Something I Can Never Have (live, Beside You In Time)

Live:Hate 1990 through present
Staple song in set except during Fragility

About

Something I Can Never Have is the fifth track on the 1989 release Pretty Hate Machine. It's a song about lost love and missed chances, though the true story about the song isn't wildly (or at all) known. It is the first song in which Trent Reznor plays a piano and is the first song in which he uses the word "fuck" ("fading fucking reminder").

Song Credits

• Production: Trent Reznor, John Fryer
• Engineer/Mix: John Fryer

Appearances

Halos

• Pretty Hate Machine
• Closure (Live)
• Still (Reworked)
• Beside You In Time (Live)

Other

• Natural Born Killers Soundtrack

Versions

Something I Can Never Have

This is the original album version.

Something I Can Never Have (Natural Born Killers Soundtrack)

Coming soon

Something I Can Never Have (Still)

This stripped-down reworking consists of Reznor on piano and vocals, and Jerome Dillon on guitar.

Song Credits

• Performance: Trent Reznor, Jerome Dillon
• Mix engineering: Alan Moulder
• Engineering: Alan Moulder
• Second engineering: Leo Herrera
• Programming: Keith Hillebrandt

Live

A difference from the studio version is the noticeably louder drums that are persistent in the choruses. The keyboard part is usually played by the bassist (Danny Lohner and Jeordie White).

During Woodstock and Self Destruct, Trent ended the song with "I can never have... and you will never, ever, ever understand... how I feel."

Since Live: With Teeth, the last chorus has seen an additional rising guitar screech.

Live, from Closure

Coming soon

Live, from Beside You In Time

Coming soon

Lyrics

    I still recall the taste of your tears
    Echoing you voice just like the ringing in my ears
    My favorite dreams of you still wash ashore
    Scraping through my head ‘till I don’t want to sleep anymore
    
    Come on tell me
    Make this all go away
    You make this all go away
    I’m down to just one thing and I’m stating to scare myself
    Make this all go away
    You make this all go away
    I just want something
    I just want something I can never have
    
    You always were the one to show me how
    Back then I couldn’t do the things that I can do now
    This thing is slowly taking me apart
    Grey would be the color if I had a heart
    
    I just want something I can never have
    
    In this place it seems like such a shame
    Though it all looks different now, I know it’s still the same
    Everywhere I look you’re all I see
    Just a fading fucking reminder of who I used to be
    
    Come on tell me
    Make this all go away
    You make this all go away
    I’m down to just one thing and I’m starting to scare myself
    Make this all go away
    You make this all go away
    I just want something
    I just want something I can never have
    I just want something I can never have
    
    Think I know what you meant
    That night on my bed
    Still picking at this scab
    I wish you were dead
    Your sweat and Perry Ellis
    Just stains on my sheets