Nick Cave presents his book “Faith, Hope and Carnage” at the Lit.Cologne Special in the Theater am Tanzbrunnen.
Photo: dpa/Rolf Vennenbernd
Some say that in the end no one is completely immune from religiosity. Even the strict atheist shows himself to be receptive to it in existential life crises. And so it is not surprising that even Nick Cave, once the nihilistic shining light in West Berlin in the 1980s alongside Blixa Cash, does not shy away from absolute light and divine love.
Because after two of his sons died within the past ten years, his last two albums “Skeleton Tree” and “Ghosteen” were each characterized in their own way by coming to terms with personal pain. With the recently released »Wild God«, the 18th album by Caves and his accompanying band Bad Seeds, a new chapter now seems to have opened.
This is first and foremost noticeable in the sound: the opener “Song Of The Lake” impresses with a remarkable presence from the first bar. Drums, bass, guitar, piano and string arrangements pile up in it. And towering over everything is the organ of Cave, who sometimes preaches in the style of a spoken word artist, only to reveal the sacred potential of his voice in the next moment.
“And he knew that even though he had found Heaven/ Such as described in the ancient scrolls/ Still, he felt the drag of Hell/ Upon his old and mortal soul,” he sings in the song. The line already exemplifies that “Wild God” is far from being a peaceful worship record. On the contrary, the doubt, the sadness, the inscrutability are as inscribed in her as ever.
This is also the case in the following title track, which, however, explodes into an anthem-like chorus. And the pre-single “Joy” underlines what has become a core element of Cave’s work over the last 40 years: paradise cannot be had without hell. “I woke up this morning with the blues all around my head,” he whimpers in the opening lines, and then: “Have mercy on me, please,” before everything dissolves into “Joy, Joy, Joy” towards the end.
The sonic opulence of the album is no coincidence: the native Australian recently said in an interview that he wanted to keep his band more busy again after their recent work had been severely reduced. And so, after the two predecessors, which were characterized by sound tinkering, more time was now invested in the development of arrangements and melodies.
Once again he worked closely with the multi-instrumentalist Warren Ellis, who has become a central figure in the Bad Seeds since 1993. Part of the musical diversity of the ten new pieces are also mythical-seeming choirs that were already present on “Skeleton Tree” four years ago and which once again underline Cave’s passion for gospel – as in the devotional ballad “As The Water Cover The Sea”. «, which concludes the album.
And so in the end “Wild God” – like so many of Cave’s albums – is neither an album of joy nor an album of sadness. It defies dichotomizations of this kind. If anything, then it is an album of life.
Nick Cave: Wild God (Pias)
Subscribe to the “nd”
Being left is complicated.
We keep track!
With our digital promotional subscription you can read all issues of »nd« digitally (nd.App or nd.Epaper) for little money at home or on the go.
Subscribe now!
sbobet88 link sbobet judi bola link sbobet