Nick Cave - Henry's Dream [Remastered] CD Review (Mute)

Nick Cave's seventh studio album, Henry's Dream (1992), is the last of the current set of reissues. This sound of this album heads back toward the dark intensity of Tender Prey without giving up the acoustic sounds of The Good Son.

“Henry’s Dream,” explains Nick Cave, “was one of the first records that I came to with an absolute sound in my head as to how this record should be. What I wanted to make with Henry’s Dream was a very violent acoustic record, basically using storytelling and acoustic instruments to create a really fucked up and violent sound, but which was in no way heavy. This, sadly, didn’t happen” This comment aside, Henry's Dream was one of Cave's strongest release to date and roughly half of the songs on this disc ("Jack The Ripper", "I Had A Dream Joe", "Papa Won't Leave You Henry" and "Brother My Cup is Empty") are staples in the band's live set.





At the time, this was probably one the more polished Bad Seeds releases but this plays more into the band's evolving sound along with newcomer producer David Briggs (Neil Young) rather than the changes in line-up. Between The Good Son and Henry's Dream, Kid Congo had left the fold and the Bad Seeds added Conway Savage on piano and ex-Triffid Martyn Casey on bass.

Like the other reissues in this series, this release is a digi-pack with a bonus DVD. The tracks on the DVD are:

Henry's Dream album in 5:1

Extra tracks:
Blue Bird
Jack The Ripper (Acoustic version)
I Had a Dream Joe (Live)
The Good Son (Live)
The Mercy Seat (Live)
The Carny (Live)
The Ship Song (Live)

Videos: – also available for download to MP3/Ipod

Music videos:
I Had a Dream, Joe
Straight to You
Jack the Ripper (Acoustic Version)

"Do You Love Me Like I Love You": (Part 7: Henry's Dream)
Directed by Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard

Links:
Nick Cave

Nick Cave - The Good Son [Remastered] CD Review (Mute)

Nick Cave's sixth album, The Good Son (1990), completed his transition into the mainstream. Cave forgoes the dark intensity of Tender Prey on this disc and the (almost) Southern gospel songs on this disc are powered by Cave's vocals accompanied by keyboards and strings. As Cave had discovered a new-found sobriety and had also found love with Brazilian stylist Viviane Carneiro, most of the songs on The Good Son are mid-tempo, piano-driven explorations of love and sorrow.

To set the stage for these recordings, Nick remained in São Paulo after the Tender Prey tour while the rest of the band returned to Berlin.

“I started to write a lot and I didn’t really go back; I just stayed in Brazil. A lot of stuff started to come quite quickly: ‘The Weeping Song’, ‘The Ship Song’, ‘Foi Na Cruz’ - these extremely sweet love songs appeared.” As it turned out, the songs from that period prefigure and hint at something that would henceforward become a Cave obsession: to write a kind of “classic” love song, a craft he would devote many years to fine honing.

It was during this period also that Nick really began to come to grips with the piano as a compositional tool. Although he’d had two years of piano lessons in his pre-teens and knew how to make a chord, for all practical purposes, Cave could not perform at the keyboard as fluidly as his songs demanded. “In the early days,” he admits, “there was no way I could sit down and play and sing a song that sounded convincing. That’s not to say I couldn’t hear how it could it be in my head, but it would very much have to be interpreted by the band. Something like ‘The Carny’ for example: all the parts were written on the piano. I just couldn’t necessarily play the stuff.”

When originally released, the release of this disc was preceded by "The Ship Song / The Train Song" 7" which set the stage for the piano/strings balladry of the full disc. Keeping in that same vein, the disc opens with "Foi Na Cruz" which, according to Wikipedia, is based partly upon the traditional Brazilian Protestant hymn of the same title. Bookending the disc is the ballad "Lucy" which features Roland Wolf's last recorded work with the band.



There are a couple of up-tempo songs on the disc - "The Witness Song" has the hand-clapping groove of a Southern revival and "The Hammer Song" has some of the Tender Prey's dark intensity.

Like the Tender Prey, this release is a digi-pack with a bonus DVD. The tracks on the DVD are:

The Good Son album in 5:1

Extra tracks:
The Train Song
Cocks 'n' Asses
Helpless
(Note: all three tracks are on Cave's B-Sides & Rarities)

Videos: – also available for download to MP3/Ipod

Music videos:
The Weeping Song
The Ship Song

"Do You Love Me Like I Love You": (Part 6: The Good Son)
Directed by Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard

Links:
Nick Cave

Nick Cave - Tender Prey [Remastered] CD Review (Mute)

Nick Cave's fifth album, Tender Prey (1988), was his great leap forward. This was the first disc where Cave made a complete break from his raw, experimental Birthday Party roots and this disc establishes him as a (surprisingly) accessible epic storyteller / songwriter. The band's sound benefits from the additions of Kid Congo Powers (guitar), who was juggling a second trip through the Gun Club at the time, and keyboard/organist Roland Wolf.

Tender Prey kicks off with the seven+ minute death-row story, "Mercy Seat", which has become one of Cave's signature tunes. The are a couple other Cave staples on this disc which include the darkly pulsing "Up Jumped the Devil" and garage-rock murder ballad "Deanna".



Although Nick had lyrics ready to go for “The Mercy Seat”, the song had not yet fully taken shape. Nick attests that he sat down in the studio piano and devised a descending chord structure and “…that I was able to sing the words to those chords. Then Mick threw in the E minor – B flat vamp.” However, rather than starting with the piano, recording of the basic tracks for “The Mercy Seat” actually began with a loop which Mick says “came out of the same idea that Nick had been trying to do for ages: he wanted to have a song that was really relentlessly at you and in your face.” Nick affirms he was aiming for an aggressive rapid-fire machine-like effect similar to the churning rhythm of “Harlem” by Suicide, “… but we didn’t know how to do that, so we did it with drumsticks on the open tuning of the bass”.

Like the previous Nick Cave reissues that Mute released earlier this year, Tender Prey comes in a digi-pack with a bonus DVD. The DVD contains the album remastered in 5.1 surround sound plus the following bonus tracks & videos:

Bonus Tracks
The Mercy Seat (Video version)
Girl at the Bottom of my Glass
The Mercy Seat (Acoustic version)
City of Refuge (Acoustic version)
Deanna (Acoustic version)

Videos: – also available for download to MP3/Ipod

Music videos:
The Mercy Seat
Deanna

"Do You Love Me Like I Love You": (Part 5: Tender Prey)
Directed by Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard

The remastering job is stellar and stays true to the original vinyl recording. The bonus tracks are sort of hit-and-miss for me as four of the five tracks are on Cave' 2005 release B-Sides & Rarities and I'm not much for music videos. "Do You Love Me Like I Love You" is a bit more intriguing but it is the sort of "Behind the Music" footage that you will watch once and will be unlikely pick up again anytime soon.

"Do You Love Me Like I Love You" is a series of 14 new short films by British artists Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard to accompany each album. Each 40-minute film features a compelling collage of the famous, infamous and unknown talking directly to camera about what the songs mean to them. The result is a determinedly human portrait of the unique body of work, told through those who have lived and loved the music.



Links:
Nick Cave

The Buzzcocks Release Deluxe Versions of Their First Three CDs Next Month (Mute)

Mute Records are giving deluxe treatment to the first three Buzzcocks albums next month. Another Music in a Different Kitchen, Love Bites and A Different Kind of Tension will be re-released on Feb. 9th as 2CD sets containing demos, live shows and all the relevant non-lp singles.

The Buzzcocks first disc, Another Music in a Different Kitchen, contains a John Peel session, fourteen demos and a full live show recorded at the last night of the Electric Circus in October 1977. Love Bites contains two Peel sessions as well as thirteen demos from Summer 1978 and a full concert from the Lesser Free Trade Hall in June 1978. A Different Kind of Tension includes all the associated singles (including "Parts 1–3"), two different John Peel sessions and eleven demos.

Here is the full track listing:

A Different Kind Of Tension

CD 1
1-Paradise
2-Sitting ‘round At Home
3-You Say You Don’t Love Me
4-You Know You Can’t Help It
5-Mad Mad Judy
6-Raison D’Etre
7-I Don’t Know What To Do With My Life
8-Money
9-Hollow Inside
10- A Different Kind Of Tension
11-I Believe
12-Radio Nine

Associated Singles
13-Everybody’s Happy Nowadays
14-Why Can’t I Touch It
15-Harmony In My Head
16-Something’s Gone Wrong Again

CD 2
Associated Singles
1-Are Everything
2-Why She’s A Girl From The Chainstore
3-Airwaves Dream
4-Strange Thing
5-What Do You Know?
6-Running Free
7-I Look Alone

Demos
8-You Say You Don’t Love Me (Demo)
9-I Don’t Know What To Do With My Life (Demo)
10-Harmony In My Head (Demo)*
11-I Don’t Know (Demo)
12-Run Away From Home (Demo)
13-The Drive System (Demo)
14-Mad Mad Judy (Demo)*
15-Jesus Made Me Feel Guilty (Demo)
16-Something’s Gone Wrong Again (backing track) *
17-You Know You Can’t Help It
18-I Believe July 1979 Indigo Arrow-Chronology

BBC Sessions

John Peel Show 10/18/78 TX 10/23/78
19-Everybody's Happy Nowadays

John Peel Show 5/21/79 TX 5/28/79
20-I Don't Know What To Do With My Life
21-Mad Mad Judy
22-Hollow Inside
* previously unreleased

Another Music In A Different Kitchen

CD 1
1-Fast Cars
2-No Reply
3-You Tear Me Up
4-Get On Our Own
5-Love Battery
6-Sixteen
7-I Don’t Mind
8-Fiction Romance
9-Autonomy
10-I Need
11-Moving Away From The Pulsebeat

Associated Singles
12-Orgasm Addict
13-Whatever Happened To...?
14-What Do I Get
15-Oh Shit

BBC Session

John Peel Show 9/7/77 TX 9/19/77
16-Fast Cars (2.15)
17-(Moving Away From The) Pulsebeat (4.40)
18-What Do I Get (2.50)

CD 2
1-Boredom (demo)
2-Fast Cars (demo)
3-No Reply (demo)
4-You Tear Me Up (demo)*
5-Get On Our Own (demo) *
6-Sixteen (demo)
7-I Don’t Mind (demo) *
8-Fiction Romance (demo)
9-Autonomy (demo)
10-I Need (demo)
11-Orgasm Addict (demo)*
12-What Do I Get (demo)*
13-Whatever Happened To...? (demo)
14-Oh Shit (demo)

LIVE AT THE ELECTRIC CIRCUS
15-Fast Cars (live)*
16-Fiction Romance (live)*
17-Boredom (live)*
18-Sixteen (live)*
19-You Tear Me Up (live)*
20-Orgasm Addict (live)*
21-Moving Away From The Pulsebeat (live)*
22-Love Battery*
23-Time’s Up
*previously unreleased

Love Bites

CD 1
1-Real World
2-Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t‘ve)
3-Operators Manual
4-Nostalgia
5-Just Lust
6-Sixteen Again
7-Walking Distance
8-Love is Lies
9-Nothing Left
10-E.S.P.
11-Late For The Train

Associated singles
12-Love You More
13-Noise Annoys
14-Promises
15-Lipstick

BBC Sessions

John Peel Show 4/10/78 TX 4/17/78
16-Noise Annoys (2.55)
17-Walking Distance (2.00)
18-Late For The Train (5.10)

John Peel Show 10/18/78 TX 10/23/78
19-Promises (2.29)
20-Lipstick (2.40)
21-Sixteen Again (3.14)

John Peel Show 5/21/79 TX 5/28/79
22- E.S.P.

CD 2
1-Love Is Life (Lies) (demo)*
2-Just Lust (demo)
3-Operatoros Manual (demo)*
4-Ever Fallen In Love (demo)*
5-Nothing Left (demo)*
6-Sixteen Again (demo)*
7-Raison D’etre (demo)*
8-Real World *
9-Nostalgia (demo)*
10-E.S.P (demo)
11-Lipstick (demo)
12-Children (Promises) (demo)
13-Mother Of Turds (demo)

LIVE AT LESSER FREE TRADE HALL 7/21/1978
14-Breakdown*
15-What Do I Get*
16-I Don’t Mind*
17-Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t ‘ve)*
18-Noise Annoys*
19-Nothing Left*
20-Get On Our Own*
21-Love You More*
22-Fiction Romance*
23-Autonomy*
*previously unreleased

Links:
The Buzzcocks

Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - White Lunar CD Review (Mute)

Nick Cave and long-time The Bad Seeds/Grinderman/The Dirty Three collaborator Warren Ellis have released a hauntingly beautiful 2-CD set of predominately instrumental soundscapes. This set is compiles tracks from various soundtracks that Cave & Ellis have scored over the last five years along with four previously unreleased pieces from the Cave & Ellis archives.

Disc One contains selections from The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007), The Proposition (2005), and the forthcoming The Road (which is based on Cormac McCarthy's novel of a father and son's trek across a vast wasteland in the aftermath of global catastrophe). While the song arrangements are fairly minimalist, Nick Cave winds piano melodies around Warren Ellis' violin to create a warm but desolate landscape. Cave sings on "The Rider Song" and provides whispered vocals on "The Rider No. 2" (both from The Proposition) and both of these songs could easily fit with later-day material from The Bad Seeds.

Disc Two is a bit more eclectic and perhaps schizophrenic; it contains material from two lesser known documentaries along with the four tracks from the vaults. The two documentaries are The English Surgeon (2007) which traces Dr. Henry Marsh's struggle to bring neurosurgery to post-Soviet Ukraine and The Girls of Phnom Penh (2009) which is an investigative documentary of sex workers in Cambodia's "virginity trade". The material on this disc is claustrophobic, urban and (at times) intense. The four vault tracks fit within this musical structure and all of the tracks are named after craters. While all of the tracks are solid compositions, "Daedalus" is one of the more interesting as it segues from a sunny flute and piano-driven piece into a jagged hidden-track instrumental.

While instrumentals never seem to get a lot of repeat play, this set may well replace Sunn O)))'s Monoliths & Dimensions in my late-night listening queue.

Links:
Nick Cave