When Johnny Cash breathed his final, labored breath early Friday morning at the age of 71, a light went out in Nashville and all over the world.

In a music industry ridden with pretty faces and flash-in-the-pan pop idols, the Man in Black represented all that was right in the music world.

Born at the height of the Depression, Cash grew up a dirt-poor farmer’s boy in Arkansas, picking cotton while his mother scrimped and saved to buy him music lessons. After a stint overseas in the Air Force, Cash combined gospel, folk and blues influences and worked with the legendary Sam Phillips, the same Sun Records producer who molded Elvis Presley.

And he created a sound that was different. Unusual. Like nothing country had heard before.

“…I never would have dreamed he could have even gotten a record played on the radio,” said Roland Janes, a guitarist during Cash’s Sun sessions in the 1950s. “But he set country music on its ear.”

The grizzled country singer was long a champion for the downtrodden and a voice for those without a voice. He sang about forgotten American Indian war heroes. Outlaws. Prisoners. He sang for the common people, because he was a common person.

And like many common people, Cash was haunted by his demons. He fought a long battle against his drug addiction — Amphetamines and barbiturates were his poison of choice. Cash felt the harsh realities of life, deeply understood human suffering and used the drugs as an escape.

“There is that beast there in me,” Cash told The New York Times in 1994. “And I got to keep him caged, or he’ll eat me alive.”

You can hear that beast in songs like “Sunday Morning Coming Down” and “I Walk The Line” — the stories of a man who was his own worst enemy.

But as the decades progressed, country music changed. Caving to the influences of glitzy pop and rock ‘n’ roll, “old school” singers weren’t played on country airwaves much anymore. But Cash’s relentless creativity allowed him to remake his career several times. Cash’s music experienced yet another resurgence recently, as his melancholy cover of the ballad, “Hurt,” won an MTV Video Music Award earlier this month.

Cash’s salvation was his wife of 35 years, June Carter Cash, who helped him kick his drug habit and rediscover his Christian faith. June wrote Cash’s 1963 hit, “Ring of Fire,” about falling in love with him.

But when June passed away in May and Cash’s health continued to deteriorate, many wondered how long the legend would last.

The light that brightened the hearts of many without hope is gone. But Cash’s legacy of integrity and compassion will continue to inspire those left in the darkness.