Nick Cave

January 17, 2024

Today I learned what's up with Nick Cave ¹.

After I listened to a buddy of mine explain his Nick Cave listening habits recently, I decided to do a bit more of the deep dive. Over the last week or so, I've listened to about ten albums, read excerpts from his books, and watched a bunch of live performances alongside a documentary. I'm writing this mostly as a response to my friend, but I figured I'd put it here for anyone else interested.

I'm not new to Nick. I got my first Cave album in 11th grade after hearing one of his songs on the Until the End of the World soundtrack ². I was pretty obsessed with that soundtrack at the time because of the feel it had and I would suppose the state of mind I occupied. Years later I would discover that I also liked the film of the same name and its director. I bought Cave's worst album to date, Kicking Against the Pricks ³ which left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth that just hasn't left. I likely got it because of the title or that I recognized some of the tracks since they're all covers which is not exactly what highlights the best of Cave. And again about six years ago I ran across someone who had cited Nick from an essay on his Red Hand Files website. And then I ran across another and read a bunch so I subscribed and receive them regularly. I wrote a quick note about Nick last May when I juxtaposed an image of him next to Princess Anne at the King Charles Coronation⁴.

A lot has been written on Nick so I'm just going to shoot straight how I see it. Nick's father died in a car crash when he was a teen. He was obsessed with an outlaw character prior. He dropped out of art school to pursue music. He was a functioning heroin addict for decades and dabbled in other drugs. Cave has lost two children both under pressing circumstances. Meanwhile, he's managed to dodge every stereotype that's ever been attempted to pin on him. He's no stranger to friction given that he's often supported other artists in their more controversial stances. I can respect all of this and empathize with this type of unmoved personality.

Here's a clip of Cave performing Higgs Boson Blues from Distant Sky: Live in Copenhagen⁵.

Hannah Montana does the African savannah
As the simulated raining season begins
She curses the cue with the Zulu
And moves onto Amazonia, cries with the dolphins
The Mai-Mai eat the pigmy, the pigmy eat the monkey
The monkey has a gift that he is sending back to you
Look, here comes the missionary with his smallpox and flu
He's saving them savages with his Higgs Boson blues

Yup, the lyrics are pretty out there and the Higgs boson⁶ is sometimes called The God Particle. Cave weaves in a bunch of themes seemingly at will but the overarching tone is mostly somewhat dark and sardonic. I like his stage presence and I certainly wouldn't call his interplay of humor and violence a shtick. It's obvious he's in it. In his most recent book Faith, Hope, and Carnage⁷, which is a long-form interview he mostly leans on spirituality and art-making which is what I think is where his potency lies. In a 2022 interview, he said "It’s the push and pull of the good and the bad that exists within art that makes it beautiful to me."⁸ That's exactly how I'd describe his music... it's sorta manic - soft and angry at the same time. If I had to pick two albums, they'd be Ghosteen (2019)⁹ and Dig, Lazarus Dig!!! ( 2008)¹⁰ which mostly fall on either side of the spectrum.

In the midst of my Nick Cave binge, I read a response on The Red Hand Files a couple of days ago¹¹ that sealed the deal on this essay. I prefer Nick Cave when he's personal and empathetic, but I don't see as much sincerity or possibly can't relate to his music, fiction, and poetry. And for that reason, if I had to pick one of his art forms to keep, it'd be his letters. Before even knowing that much about Cave, I might have described him as a strange mix between Leonard Cohen and Elvis. Cave has cited Leonard Cohen as the greatest musician ever on several occasions and said "Elvis is my hero. There was an aspect to the story of his later years that is almost religious to me"⁷. I even watched some of the videos of Elvis' last performance to get a feel for what he had mentioned.

There was a particular time in my life when I was pretty fixated on Leonard Cohen's Everybody Knows after seeing it in the film Pump up the Volume¹². It's the somber 'poor fools' attitude I preferred to carry alongside my oh-so-cool smoking habit at the time.

Opening scene of Pump up the Volume

Cave mixes this in perfectly with a bit more angst. While I mostly think it's a symptom of overconfidence and self-importance, I appreciate the artistic outcome. The tortured artist tends to manifest itself. And even if it didn't start off sincere, it certainly morphed into it and his more recent conversations about it all are spot on. In one of her few interviews, his former girlfriend Polly (PJ) Harvey said "The tortured artist myth is rampant. People paint me as some kind of black witchcraft practicing devil from hell, that I have to be twisted and dark to do what I’m doing. It’s a load of rubbish". Unfortunately, reflecting on my own experience, I happen to believe that Nick likely falls into the pile which isn't to say the world or I haven't gained from it. I'm glad that older Nick made it out alive and is here to tell the story. I wrote a note to Nick once via The Red Hand Files that went unanswered. It was likely because he didn't know why his team might remove the RSS syndication, so I'd reply in a sardonic fashion with "It's an effort to collect my addresses to solicit some Bad Seed swag". No worries Nick, your responses are so good that I've gladly caved. 👈🏼 I take it you see what I did there.

My favorite quote on the tortured artist is by Tom Robbins who wrote in Jitterbug Perfume¹³ "Unhappiness is the ultimate form of self-indulgence. When you're unhappy, you get to pay a lot of attention to yourself. You get to take yourself oh so very seriously". I think I understand quite a bit about hypersensitivity and the joy of seeing the world through other perspectives is never lost on me. For now, I'm moving on from my binge and the best outcome is that I'll likely revisit it every so often as a reminder to try not to take myself or anything too seriously.

See also:​

Footnotes​

See also:

Footnotes