Like most career musicians his age (and especially in light of his life circumstances), I'm sure Nick needs his music more than we do.
Those artists that change and shake things up with careers over thirty forty years are the most interesting to me. Doing the same thing over and over bores me and a series of records that go more inward or outward from the artist’s earlier recordings excite me to no end. I’m also one who loves Dylan’s Sinatra style crooner exploration; even 5 LPs worth. He puts out so much Original music ( in addition to the countless bootleg records) that he deserves a mini extended jaunt into something out of his comfort zone. Cave is in a similar situation and I’ll follow both to wherever they take me.
Murder Ballads is definitely a sleeper in the catalog for me. Looking back, I can see why the only place to go from there was to something like Boatman's Call. I mean, how do you keep with dark tales of madness and violence without veering into self-parody? There are pretty big chunks of MB that I can't get into, but when it's good, it's amazing. I still remember the first song I was introduced to by Cave, "Up Jumped the Devil." I didn't know what to make of it then and I still sometimes don't. That's the nature of Cave's stuff. I was lucky though in that the first new album put out by the Bad Seeds after I'd really become a fan was Abbatoir Blues / Lyre of Orpheus, so I was in good hands. This ties back to the often-repeated interview question I see asked of what we'll politely call "legacy" musicians of if they see themselves retiring. The answer is usually some form of "What the hell else would I do!? Take up gardening?" Once it's an intrinsic part of who and what you are, I can't imagine it leaves easily.
Sorry, but I've gotta go old school if we're looking for the best video. Nothing cooler than watching Nick and Blixa ham it up for a goofy video and an excellent track.
I'm pretty sure Einsturzende Neubauten made their own Flowbees by the way their hair looked in the early days. Blixa has had some amazing looks over the years.
Glad he was still in the band, the one and only time I saw them. And Mick Harvey. It’s messed up they aren’t in the line up anymore.
Do you Caveheads (sorry - joking obv Cave newbie here) know about David Sylvian’s Blemish album? A raw, electronic, droney divorce album, which similarly divided Sylvian’s fanbase. I’m getting strong vibes of that one listening to Ghosteen so far.
I'm not familiar with it, but I did enjoy Japan, and need to check Sylvian out at some point. It seems Brilliant Trees would be the place to start from all the rave reviews I have heard for it.
I understand that people grow out of working relationships, but I at least agree that his current band shouldn't be called "the Bad Seeds."
I have a mixed relationship with this album. It's grown on me over time, but it's still not something I reach for often. The follow-ups, Manafon and Dyed in the Wool were much stronger examples of this minimalist approach in my opinion. And you guys are killing me. Here I am, trying to stick to my guns to actually wait for a physical copy before laying ears on the new Cave, and you're intriguing me with connections to other albums that have challenged me in interesting and positive ways.
Song shuffle on Amazon (which I set up to shuffle songs from a few hundred albums at a time) seems to be a fan of "Night Raid" (haha--I just mean that for some reason that track is playing a lot more than the others), so that one in particular is growing a lot on me.
I release stuff under a band name that's something like "Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds," and some of the people working with me change regularly, plus as often as not, it's really all just me (I'm a multi-instrumentalist). So it could be just that Cave really likes the name, really likes the idea of the "persona" of the band name and sees it as something of a focused, "alter-ego" pseudonym that he wants to release material under regardless of just who he's working with on a given project or track.
That's a valid point, but in reality the name is associated with new Cave recordings... and many folks don't even bother to name the seeds when referencing the albums. Some folks just don't like the new style of the album and want it ostracised from the catalog lol.
Tracey Thorn’s beautifully written thoughts on the album... Nick Cave’s new album Ghosteen has completely floored me. In a good way
Absolutely right. His catalog gets stranger as it goes along so you may or may not hit a jumping off point somewhere along the line. I love it all but YMMV. I know there are a lot of old school Sylvian/Japan fans who don’t care for his current direction.
I have heard quite a bit of the new Nick Cave album, as it's this week's feature album on RTRfm. I'm sorry, it just does nothing for me. I'm sorry he lost his son and he's entitled to grieve, but it does not make for great entertainment. It's a dirge - almost literally. I don't demand that music be happy, but this is just too miserable for me to listen to.
I just listened to the album full for the first time. My reaction is: So, is a new Grinderman album coming out soon? Qualification - I only have 3 of his albums so far. I think it is great when artists don't repeat themselves. On the other hand I am not a completest. P.S. Just to prove I read at least some of the previous posts - I would in no way compare Cave to the one song of Leo Sayer that I only vaguely remember from the 70s.
