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A piece done for The Mercury. The entire tour eventually got cancelled, and the piece never aired. Written September 2001. DARKER WITH THE DAY by Jamie S. Rich Nick
Cave & the Bad Seeds Before I sat down to type this, the world dimmed a little. Monday, September 10, I was supposed to interview Nick Cave. I was to phone him in London first thing in the morning. Unfortunately, some last minute "tour meeting" came along and I was informed King Ink wasn't going to be able to speak with me. I was going to have to come up with 750 words without his help. Then Tuesday got all bent out of shape. One of the questions I had originally planned to ask the gaunt crooner was, "Your music deals in themes of violence, often harsh and medieval... do you find the world is more violent now, or has man always been this way?" It seemed to be a pertinent question for a singer who released a whole album of songs about homicide (Murder Ballads, Mute 1996). But then, of course, life came along and answered the question for me. Man has always had a bestial side, and it's never going to go away. Just when you think you've seen how horrible one human being can be to another, someone else comes along and does something so shocking, it makes everything else seem tiny by comparison. In the wake of the last week's mind-altering events (yesterday as I type this), and with the deadline for this article looming, I decided to rethink my approach and spend some quality time with Nick Cave's music. I started with 1990's The Good Son, probably my favorite of his discography. It's full of primal emotion and danger and was a precursor to the latter-day Cave of 1997's The Boatman's Call and this year's No More Shall We Part. While much of the Bad Seeds' music is about bombast and chaos, as each of the six or more members savage their instruments simultaneously, Cave's approach here is much more direct, relying on piano, percussion, and voice rather than anarchic, wailing guitars. I came to Nick Cave in an odd way. Unlike most people, I didn't become a fan through his music. Rather, I first became enamored of the man's work by reading his 1989 novel And the Ass Saw the Angel. I'm not exactly sure what drew me to it, but in 1993, during a period of unemployment, I dug deep into his picture of southern-fried Americana, his portrait of a deranged loner with delusions of harsh, religious retribution and a love unrequited. It was a dizzying piece of literature, and I immediately began to seek out Cave's music. I found the story continued in albums like Your Funeral...My Trial (1986) and, of course, The Good Son. Reliving these memories while reliving The Good Son not only reminded me why I fell in love with Nick Cave in the first place, but also what precipitated my unasked question. Amongst its soulful tunes lurk many tales of someone gone wrong, from the lost and desolate protagonist of "The Hammer Song," to the cries of mourning in "The Weeping Song," and most prominently, the titular good son. Hellbent on killing his father, the child's legend unfolds amidst chants of "one more man gone," a nod to the all-encompassing quagmire of evil. But violence is only one half of what makes Cave's music. Like most great artists, Cave understands that nothing is singular. Violence cannot exist without its balance -- love. Without Cave's hopeless romanticism, he would be just another splatterpunk. A closer look at his music, however, reveals a belief that love is as eternal as death. In his novel, it's Eucrhid's love for Cosey Mo. On The Good Son, it's the women left behind in "The Weeping Song," the bold proclamations of "The Ship Song," the lost beauty in "Lament." Perhaps the most perfect meeting of these themes is "Straight to You" (off 1992's Henry's Dream), a song about rushing through unimaginable terrain to be with the one you love. Now, I know it sounds strange, and I know it's a bit of a stretch for relevancy, but there is something comforting in the Bad Seed message. In the face of the most gut-wrenching tragedy, the human heart still has capacity for something more. The older Cave still sees it. His latest record is, among other things, a celebration of the family life he is currently enjoying. It's a long way from a man who was notoriously once so stoned, he didn't notice that his microphone was planted in a puddle of water and spent an entire show being electrocuted. Through blood and bluster, he's found solace. And once the clouds part, so can we.
(c) 2002 Jamie S. Rich |