Latest Release
- 30 AUG 2024
- 10 Songs
- Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus · 2004
- Murder Ballads (2011 - Remaster) · 1995
- Red Right Hand (Theme from 'Peaky Blinders') - Single · 1994
- The Boatman's Call (2011 - Remaster) · 1997
- Wild God · 2024
- Wild God · 2024
- Ghosteen · 2019
- Wild God · 2024
- Murder Ballads (2011 - Remaster) · 1996
- Push the Sky Away · 2013
Essential Albums
- Though the majority of Skeleton Tree had been written and recorded before Nick Cave’s teenage son Arthur died in a tragic cliffside fall, it is almost impossible to explore this record without that context. The accident took place in July 2015, toward the end of the album’s recording sessions, and Cave did go on to alter certain lyrics in the wake of Arthur’s passing. Inevitably, a deep sense of grief and loss seeps through these slow and considered songs, which follow the lead of 2013’s Push the Sky Away to hang quietly over off-kilter loops, synths and other electronic elements introduced by close collaborator Warren Ellis. For someone who has exuded such primal confidence in the past, here Cave sounds muted, unmoored and racked with doubt. Yet his songwriting remains as focused and penetrating as ever, right from opener “Jesus Alone”. On the first of several songs that seem to touch on reaching out to someone across an impossible gulf, he sings, “With my voice I am calling you” against a low rumble of distortion and an ominous whistling motif. As always with Cave, his employment of Biblical themes only marks the start of his remarkably vivid imagery: “You’re a young man wakin’/Covered in blood that is not yours” becomes “You’re a drug addict lyin’ on your back/In a Tijuana hotel room”, among other transfigurations. Some tracks feel almost too raw and personal for us to be hearing as outsiders. “Girl in Amber” unfolds like a devastating hymnal, while the anguished “I Need You” falls into a mantra-like repetition of its title phrase. By contrast, other tracks rank among Cave’s most accessible and relatable. Haloed by standout vocals from Danish soprano Else Torp, “Distant Sky” is a gorgeous song of devotion, both familial and romantic. And on the mellower “Rings of Saturn”, Cave’s near-rapped flow of lyrics leads to a striking epiphany: “And this is the moment, this is exactly what she is born to be/And this is what she does, and this is what she is.” Cave would focus more entirely on Arthur’s absence on 2019’s Ghosteen. But as a chorus of vocals joins him on the closing title track, it’s hard not to hear the final line—“It’s alright now”—as the start of the long and painful process of learning to live without someone.
Artist Playlists
- Meet the godfather of gothic gloom.
- Discover the creative impact of the alt-hero's red right hand.
- Sex, drugs, religious ecstasy, death and rock 'n' roll.
- Their darkest, most brooding cuts are well-suited for the spookiest night of the year.
Live Albums
Compilations
More To Hear
- Mark talks with legendary punk rocker Kid Congo Powers.
- Matt delves into the catalogues of Nick Cave and slowthai.
- Delving into the catalogues of Nick Cave and slowthai.
About Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Since the ‘70s, Australian songwriter Nick Cave has built a body of work by turns terrifying, swaggering, tender and spiritual. Cave was born in 1957 in Warracknabeal and eventually headed to art school for painting in 1976. The following year, he dropped out and formed cacophonous post-punk group The Birthday Party. In the wake of their breakup in 1983, Cave started The Bad Seeds, with whom he has explored his own life and major influences—American rock ‘n’ roll and The New Testament in particular—through vicious gothic punk (their 1984 debut, From Her to Eternity), ornate piano ballads (1997’s The Boatman’s Call) and orchestral rock (2013’s Push the Sky Away). In 2019, he released the monumental, symphonic Ghosteen, an album filled with the presence of his son Arthur, who died aged 15 in 2015. Ghosteen was the clearest expression of a major shift in Cave’s sound, which he has expanded upon with his closest collaborator, multi-instrumentalist Warren Ellis. Together, they’ve worked on numerous film scores and 2021’s hallucinatory CARNAGE, on which Cave continued to confront grief, faith and hope.
- FROM
- Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
- FORMED
- 1983
- GENRE
- Rock