there is no other artist in my catalogue that has sparked such a wide range of emotions in me than nick cave. his records have been in and out of my life since his 1988 release, Tender Prey. i have probably bought and sold all the earlier cave records 3 or 4 times, lets just say i was not very good with money in my younger years. it was not until 1996 and his record Murder Ballads that i finally “got” nick cave.
as the name implies, Murder Ballads is a 10 song collection of tunes that all focus on varying degrees of murder. the creepiest in my opinion is “the curse of millhaven.” the chorus more or less centers around the fact that all of gods children all have to die. he sings it with what sounds like such distaste for human life that it’s borderline psychopathic. his duets with polly jean harvey on “henry lee” and kylie minogue on “where the roses grow” are down right gorgeous, in a morbid kind of way.
it is from this record that i learned to appreciate his earlier more trying and gothic works like Tender Prey, The Firstborn is Dead and Kicking Against the Pricks. while i dont listen to them as much as i should they serve as interesting building blocks for the nick cave of today. His last record, the double cd Abattoir Blues/Lyre of Orpheus are cave’s finest hours and bring all of these blocks together to form a record of epic proportions.
here are some random live tunes that i stole, he was willing, from nick-cave.com.
boatman’s call is my fave nick cave. ‘people ain’t no good’ is such a beautifully depressing song.
I agree, Nick Cave is a fantastic songwriter, The Good Son is one of my favourite albums, I’ve had it for 10 years and keep going back to it.
anybody has a nice “far from me” version?