nick cave epitaph at beginning of novel - stone yard devotional.
...Well, this book is set in this closed order of nuns. My narrator is going there to get away from everything, you know, one of the epigraphs is Nick Cave saying ‘I felt chastened by the world.’..
[novel not for the mousephobic - mice plague galore inside]
https://newsandreviews.substack.com/p/c ... leine-gray
https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker- ... devotional
Nick Cave
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sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
Re: Nick Cave
His connection to Leonard Cohen comes from their shared Montreal roots and similar themes in their work. If you can, definitely catch one of his live shows.
Re: Nick Cave
Joy, just joy. From the Red Hand Files:
https://www.theredhandfiles.com/bob-dyl ... our-shows/
Have you ever imagined that Bob Dylan would be attending your shows and writing nice tweets about them?
JOHN, NEW YORK, USA
Dear John,
Sitting in bed with Susie in a post-tour stupor, watching ‘Carry On Up the Khyber’ and eating Belgian chocolates (gift from a fan), my phone suddenly lit up as excited friends started sending me Bob Dylan’s tweet–
‘Saw Nick Cave in Paris recently at the Accord Arena and I was really struck by that song Joy where he sings “We’ve all had too much sorrow, now is the time for joy.” I was thinking to myself, yeah that’s about right.
I hadn’t known Bob was at the concert and his tweet was a lovely pulse of joy that penetrated my exhausted, zombied state.
‘You’ve perked up!” said Susie.
I was happy to see Bob on X, just as many on the Left had performed a Twitterectomy and headed for Bluesky. It felt admirably perverse, in a Bob Dylan kind of way. I did indeed feel it was a time for joy rather than sorrow. There had been such an excess of despair and desperation around the election, and one couldn’t help but ask when it was that politics became everything.
The world had grown thoroughly disenchanted, and its feverish obsession with politics and its leaders had thrown up so many palisades that had prevented us from experiencing the presence of anything remotely like the spirit, the sacred, or the transcendent – that holy place where joy resides. I felt proud to have been touring with The Bad Seeds and offering, in the form of a rock ‘n ’roll show, an antidote to this despair, one that transported people to a place beyond the dreadful drama of the political moment.
I was elated to think Bob Dylan had been in the audience, and since I doubt I’ll get an opportunity to thank him personally, I’ll thank him here. Thank you, Bob!
“You’ve definitely perked up!” said Susie.
Love, Nick.
PS I appreciate everyone’s patience with The Red Hand Files over the last few months. Finding the time, energy, and concentration on tour to give your questions the answers they deserve has been challenging. But I’m home now, so it will be business as usual. I’m thrilled to be back! Indeed, I’m overjoyed!
https://www.theredhandfiles.com/bob-dyl ... our-shows/
Have you ever imagined that Bob Dylan would be attending your shows and writing nice tweets about them?
JOHN, NEW YORK, USA
Dear John,
Sitting in bed with Susie in a post-tour stupor, watching ‘Carry On Up the Khyber’ and eating Belgian chocolates (gift from a fan), my phone suddenly lit up as excited friends started sending me Bob Dylan’s tweet–
‘Saw Nick Cave in Paris recently at the Accord Arena and I was really struck by that song Joy where he sings “We’ve all had too much sorrow, now is the time for joy.” I was thinking to myself, yeah that’s about right.
I hadn’t known Bob was at the concert and his tweet was a lovely pulse of joy that penetrated my exhausted, zombied state.
‘You’ve perked up!” said Susie.
I was happy to see Bob on X, just as many on the Left had performed a Twitterectomy and headed for Bluesky. It felt admirably perverse, in a Bob Dylan kind of way. I did indeed feel it was a time for joy rather than sorrow. There had been such an excess of despair and desperation around the election, and one couldn’t help but ask when it was that politics became everything.
The world had grown thoroughly disenchanted, and its feverish obsession with politics and its leaders had thrown up so many palisades that had prevented us from experiencing the presence of anything remotely like the spirit, the sacred, or the transcendent – that holy place where joy resides. I felt proud to have been touring with The Bad Seeds and offering, in the form of a rock ‘n ’roll show, an antidote to this despair, one that transported people to a place beyond the dreadful drama of the political moment.
I was elated to think Bob Dylan had been in the audience, and since I doubt I’ll get an opportunity to thank him personally, I’ll thank him here. Thank you, Bob!
“You’ve definitely perked up!” said Susie.
Love, Nick.
PS I appreciate everyone’s patience with The Red Hand Files over the last few months. Finding the time, energy, and concentration on tour to give your questions the answers they deserve has been challenging. But I’m home now, so it will be business as usual. I’m thrilled to be back! Indeed, I’m overjoyed!
-
sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
Re: Nick Cave
#306
I used to play Into My Arms for my girlfriend. I came to your concert in Birmingham, but I had to leave early. It was far too emotional for me and reminded me of the amazing times I had with my girlfriend, which I know I will never get back.
STELLAN, NANTWICH, UK
Dear Stellan,
Live music is a ritual that evokes a common emotional response to which we attach our singular experiences. When I perform on stage, I can see these unique and particular feelings play out on each face. This is one of the great privileges of being a frontman, and it is why I spend so much time close to the audience. I love to watch the emotions on people’s faces - joy, sorrow, yearning, laughter, fear, rage. The concert becomes powerfully and empathetically transactional as we experience together the therapeutic nature of the music. As the show evolves, a to-ing and fro-ing of kindness emerges, energised by our mutual regard, and the healing begins.
A live concert can feel overwhelming, even frightening, because its emotional power can suddenly bring our most buried experiences to the surface. But feelings are meant to be felt - that’s what they are for. We heal by acknowledging our emotions and test our heart’s resilience by lingering within the unbearable. It is something music can help us do. We find our hearts are much stronger than we presumed, and what we thought was unbearable was nothing of the sort. Music draws forth these subterranean feelings and simultaneously rescues us from them.
I’m happy you came to the concert in Birmingham, Stellan, but I think it was a lost opportunity to "leave early" from a feeling before it had run its course and done its reparative work. I understand it must be painful to feel those "amazing times" are behind you, but they are not, there are many more to come. There will be further heartbreaks too, but hearts break stronger. We must not retreat from our feelings. We must confront them. Rehearse them. Get better at them. To paraphrase Samuel Beckett - hurt, hurt again, hurt better. This is one of the things live music allows us to do - to hurt and heal concurrently.
My advice? Get back out there. Live life to the fullest - and stay for the whole damn show. It’s amazing.
Love, Nick
I used to play Into My Arms for my girlfriend. I came to your concert in Birmingham, but I had to leave early. It was far too emotional for me and reminded me of the amazing times I had with my girlfriend, which I know I will never get back.
STELLAN, NANTWICH, UK
Dear Stellan,
Live music is a ritual that evokes a common emotional response to which we attach our singular experiences. When I perform on stage, I can see these unique and particular feelings play out on each face. This is one of the great privileges of being a frontman, and it is why I spend so much time close to the audience. I love to watch the emotions on people’s faces - joy, sorrow, yearning, laughter, fear, rage. The concert becomes powerfully and empathetically transactional as we experience together the therapeutic nature of the music. As the show evolves, a to-ing and fro-ing of kindness emerges, energised by our mutual regard, and the healing begins.
A live concert can feel overwhelming, even frightening, because its emotional power can suddenly bring our most buried experiences to the surface. But feelings are meant to be felt - that’s what they are for. We heal by acknowledging our emotions and test our heart’s resilience by lingering within the unbearable. It is something music can help us do. We find our hearts are much stronger than we presumed, and what we thought was unbearable was nothing of the sort. Music draws forth these subterranean feelings and simultaneously rescues us from them.
I’m happy you came to the concert in Birmingham, Stellan, but I think it was a lost opportunity to "leave early" from a feeling before it had run its course and done its reparative work. I understand it must be painful to feel those "amazing times" are behind you, but they are not, there are many more to come. There will be further heartbreaks too, but hearts break stronger. We must not retreat from our feelings. We must confront them. Rehearse them. Get better at them. To paraphrase Samuel Beckett - hurt, hurt again, hurt better. This is one of the things live music allows us to do - to hurt and heal concurrently.
My advice? Get back out there. Live life to the fullest - and stay for the whole damn show. It’s amazing.
Love, Nick
-
sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
Re: Nick Cave
nick cave on desert island discs.
repeated friday 31st jan, 2025 - 09.02 hours on bbc radio 4 - for non-UKers who want to listen.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0027cgl
repeated friday 31st jan, 2025 - 09.02 hours on bbc radio 4 - for non-UKers who want to listen.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0027cgl
Re: Nick Cave
ISSUE #313 / February 2025
They say you should separate the art from the artist. I can’t do that. My childhood heroes have become monsters. Now I read that the song “I Am A God” by Kanye West should be played at your funeral. How the hell can you listen to the song without seeing the scum of a human being that Kanye has become?
JÖRG, BAD, GERMANY
Dear Jörg,
Numerous letters have come in expressing, in no uncertain terms, disapproval of my fondness for Kanye West’s music. A lot of time and energy has been spent explaining the evil of Nazism, the harm of antisemitism, why it is wrong to sell t-shirts emblazoned with swastikas and why it is unacceptable to coerce one’s girlfriend into standing naked on the red carpet at the Grammys. On that matter, it seems, we can all find some common ground. I agree.
However, I want to challenge the notion that we can separate art from the artist. I’ve written on this subject before (#149), but I thought it might be worth revisiting. From reading your recent letters, it appears that some of you assume I hold this belief. To be clear, I do not. The idea of an artist being divorced from their art is absurd. An artist and their art are fundamentally intertwined because art is the essence of the artist made manifest. The artist’s work proclaims, "This is me. I am here. This is what I am.” However, the great gift of art is the potential for the artist to excavate their interior chaos and transform it into something sublime. This is what Kanye does. This is what I strive to do, and this is the enterprise undertaken by all genuine artists. The remarkable utility of art lies in its audacity to transfigure our corrupted state and create something beautiful.
When I make a song, I do not draw from a pocket of purity isolated from the rest of me; a song is torn from all of me, the mess of me, becoming the best of me on its alchemical journey to its realisation. This is the very definition of hope - that we are not prisoners of our flawed nature but can transcend it. We look to artists and their art to convey this exact thing. In his brokenness, Kanye is an exemplar par excellence of this notion, the braided dance between sin, transcendence and genius.
We are all broken, flawed, and suffering human beings, each a disaster in our own right, each with the capacity to cause great harm, each brimming with misguided notions, perhaps the most deluded of which is the belief that we are somehow exclusively and morally superior to everyone else. Many of you might be thinking, "Well, speak for yourself! I’m not like Kanye! I could never behave like that!" Yet, given the circumstances, we humans are capable of anything. To be human is to be flawed, yet it is also to possess the potential to achieve staggering things - beautiful, brilliant, inspiring, wild and audacious things; things to be cherished, despite our complex and compromised natures.
As odious and disappointing as many of Kanye’s views are, and as sickening as antisemitism is - in its sadly always-present, ever-morphing forms - I endeavour to seek beauty wherever it presents itself. In doing so, I am reluctant to invalidate the best of us in an attempt to punish the worst. I don’t think we can afford that luxury.
Love, Nick
They say you should separate the art from the artist. I can’t do that. My childhood heroes have become monsters. Now I read that the song “I Am A God” by Kanye West should be played at your funeral. How the hell can you listen to the song without seeing the scum of a human being that Kanye has become?
JÖRG, BAD, GERMANY
Dear Jörg,
Numerous letters have come in expressing, in no uncertain terms, disapproval of my fondness for Kanye West’s music. A lot of time and energy has been spent explaining the evil of Nazism, the harm of antisemitism, why it is wrong to sell t-shirts emblazoned with swastikas and why it is unacceptable to coerce one’s girlfriend into standing naked on the red carpet at the Grammys. On that matter, it seems, we can all find some common ground. I agree.
However, I want to challenge the notion that we can separate art from the artist. I’ve written on this subject before (#149), but I thought it might be worth revisiting. From reading your recent letters, it appears that some of you assume I hold this belief. To be clear, I do not. The idea of an artist being divorced from their art is absurd. An artist and their art are fundamentally intertwined because art is the essence of the artist made manifest. The artist’s work proclaims, "This is me. I am here. This is what I am.” However, the great gift of art is the potential for the artist to excavate their interior chaos and transform it into something sublime. This is what Kanye does. This is what I strive to do, and this is the enterprise undertaken by all genuine artists. The remarkable utility of art lies in its audacity to transfigure our corrupted state and create something beautiful.
When I make a song, I do not draw from a pocket of purity isolated from the rest of me; a song is torn from all of me, the mess of me, becoming the best of me on its alchemical journey to its realisation. This is the very definition of hope - that we are not prisoners of our flawed nature but can transcend it. We look to artists and their art to convey this exact thing. In his brokenness, Kanye is an exemplar par excellence of this notion, the braided dance between sin, transcendence and genius.
We are all broken, flawed, and suffering human beings, each a disaster in our own right, each with the capacity to cause great harm, each brimming with misguided notions, perhaps the most deluded of which is the belief that we are somehow exclusively and morally superior to everyone else. Many of you might be thinking, "Well, speak for yourself! I’m not like Kanye! I could never behave like that!" Yet, given the circumstances, we humans are capable of anything. To be human is to be flawed, yet it is also to possess the potential to achieve staggering things - beautiful, brilliant, inspiring, wild and audacious things; things to be cherished, despite our complex and compromised natures.
As odious and disappointing as many of Kanye’s views are, and as sickening as antisemitism is - in its sadly always-present, ever-morphing forms - I endeavour to seek beauty wherever it presents itself. In doing so, I am reluctant to invalidate the best of us in an attempt to punish the worst. I don’t think we can afford that luxury.
Love, Nick
Re: Nick Cave
I posted this video link in another area of the forum -- it features Stephen Fry reading one of Nick Cave's letters. I think that it is exceptional!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGJcF4bLKd4
And, here is a trancription of the letter...
In August of this year, as part of his correspondence project, Cave was asked questions about creativity and ChatGPT by two fans, Leon and Charlie. Here is his reply:
Dear Leon and Charlie,
In the story of the creation, God makes the world, and everything in it, in six days. On the seventh day he rests. The day of rest is significant because it suggests that the creation required a certain effort on God’s part, that some form of artistic struggle had taken place. This struggle is the validating impulse that gives God’s world its intrinsic meaning. The world becomes more than just an object full of other objects, rather it is imbued with the vital spirit, the pneuma, of its creator.
ChatGPT rejects any notions of creative struggle, that our endeavours animate and nurture our lives giving them depth and meaning. It rejects that there is a collective, essential and unconscious human spirit underpinning our existence, connecting us all through our mutual striving.
ChatGPT is fast-tracking the commodification of the human spirit by mechanising the imagination. It renders our participation in the act of creation as valueless and unnecessary. That ‘songwriter ‘you were talking to, Leon, who is using ChatGPT to write ‘his’ lyrics because it is ‘faster and easier ,’is participating in this erosion of the world’s soul and the spirit of humanity itself and, to put it politely, should fucking desist if he wants to continue calling himself a songwriter.
ChatGPT’s intent is to eliminate the process of creation and its attendant challenges, viewing it as nothing more than a time-wasting inconvenience that stands in the way of the commodity itself. Why strive?, it contends. Why bother with the artistic process and its accompanying trials? Why shouldn’t we make it ‘faster and easier?’
When the God of the Bible looked upon what He had created, He did so with a sense of accomplishment and saw that ‘it was good‘. ‘It was good ‘because it required something of His own self, and His struggle imbued creation with a moral imperative, in short love. Charlie, even though the creative act requires considerable effort, in the end you will be contributing to the vast network of love that supports human existence. There are all sorts of temptations in this world that will eat away at your creative spirit, but none more fiendish than that boundless machine of artistic demoralisation, ChatGPT.
As humans, we so often feel helpless in our own smallness, yet still we find the resilience to do and make beautiful things, and this is where the meaning of life resides. Nature reminds us of this constantly. The world is often cast as a purely malignant place, but still the joy of creation exerts itself, and as the sun rises upon the struggle of the day, the Great Crested Grebe dances upon the water. It is our striving that becomes the very essence of meaning. This impulse – the creative dance – that is now being so cynically undermined, must be defended at all costs, and just as we would fight any existential evil, we should fight it tooth and nail, for we are fighting for the very soul of the world.
Love, Nick
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGJcF4bLKd4
And, here is a trancription of the letter...
In August of this year, as part of his correspondence project, Cave was asked questions about creativity and ChatGPT by two fans, Leon and Charlie. Here is his reply:
Dear Leon and Charlie,
In the story of the creation, God makes the world, and everything in it, in six days. On the seventh day he rests. The day of rest is significant because it suggests that the creation required a certain effort on God’s part, that some form of artistic struggle had taken place. This struggle is the validating impulse that gives God’s world its intrinsic meaning. The world becomes more than just an object full of other objects, rather it is imbued with the vital spirit, the pneuma, of its creator.
ChatGPT rejects any notions of creative struggle, that our endeavours animate and nurture our lives giving them depth and meaning. It rejects that there is a collective, essential and unconscious human spirit underpinning our existence, connecting us all through our mutual striving.
ChatGPT is fast-tracking the commodification of the human spirit by mechanising the imagination. It renders our participation in the act of creation as valueless and unnecessary. That ‘songwriter ‘you were talking to, Leon, who is using ChatGPT to write ‘his’ lyrics because it is ‘faster and easier ,’is participating in this erosion of the world’s soul and the spirit of humanity itself and, to put it politely, should fucking desist if he wants to continue calling himself a songwriter.
ChatGPT’s intent is to eliminate the process of creation and its attendant challenges, viewing it as nothing more than a time-wasting inconvenience that stands in the way of the commodity itself. Why strive?, it contends. Why bother with the artistic process and its accompanying trials? Why shouldn’t we make it ‘faster and easier?’
When the God of the Bible looked upon what He had created, He did so with a sense of accomplishment and saw that ‘it was good‘. ‘It was good ‘because it required something of His own self, and His struggle imbued creation with a moral imperative, in short love. Charlie, even though the creative act requires considerable effort, in the end you will be contributing to the vast network of love that supports human existence. There are all sorts of temptations in this world that will eat away at your creative spirit, but none more fiendish than that boundless machine of artistic demoralisation, ChatGPT.
As humans, we so often feel helpless in our own smallness, yet still we find the resilience to do and make beautiful things, and this is where the meaning of life resides. Nature reminds us of this constantly. The world is often cast as a purely malignant place, but still the joy of creation exerts itself, and as the sun rises upon the struggle of the day, the Great Crested Grebe dances upon the water. It is our striving that becomes the very essence of meaning. This impulse – the creative dance – that is now being so cynically undermined, must be defended at all costs, and just as we would fight any existential evil, we should fight it tooth and nail, for we are fighting for the very soul of the world.
Love, Nick
Re: Nick Cave
He's right you know.
-
sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
Nick Cave - death of bunny munro - sky drama
scroll down at link for info.
----------
...The Death of Bunny Munro is a six-part Sky Original TV series based on Nick Cave’s sophomore novel of the same name. The series will see acclaimed actor Matt Smith star as the titular character and executive produce...
https://www.sky.com/watch/the-death-of-bunny-munro
----------
...The Death of Bunny Munro is a six-part Sky Original TV series based on Nick Cave’s sophomore novel of the same name. The series will see acclaimed actor Matt Smith star as the titular character and executive produce...
https://www.sky.com/watch/the-death-of-bunny-munro
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sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
nick cave - wings of desire
...Nick Cave and his band were based in West Berlin, with Wenders calling him "a real Berlin hero" and deciding "It was inconceivable for me to make a film in Berlin without showing one of his concerts"...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wings_of_Desire
i wonder if mimi cave is related to nick but no evidence immediately obtainable online.
https://www.cleartalentgroup.com/client ... 20director.
a youtube commentator says
Wings of Desire, one of my all time favorites…. And it’s got Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds performing. Who I’ve seen live many times. And if you yell out, •Tell me about the girl”, just like in the film, he’ll play the song"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95-0GbTmTwo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wings_of_Desire
i wonder if mimi cave is related to nick but no evidence immediately obtainable online.
https://www.cleartalentgroup.com/client ... 20director.
a youtube commentator says
Wings of Desire, one of my all time favorites…. And it’s got Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds performing. Who I’ve seen live many times. And if you yell out, •Tell me about the girl”, just like in the film, he’ll play the song"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95-0GbTmTwo
Re: Nick Cave
The Red Hand Files
ISSUE #317 / March 2025 CRUCIFIED TREE FORM - THE AGONY BY THEYRE LEE-ELLIOT, 1959
I was recently listening to Skeleton Tree and realised all these years I’d misheard one of your lyrics.
I always heard…’but the echo comes back EMPTY.’
This line always struck a chord in my heart. I’d recently lost my wife to cancer, left to cope with two beautiful young children and I often imagined calling across the water to her but the echo coming back empty.
I’d never dare suggest that my lyric is better, but would you agree that it might be almost as good as yours?
RUSSELL, CHELSMFORD, USA
Dear Russell,
A dark cloud hangs over the album Skeleton Tree. I have always felt it to be a record that possessed a shocking, premonitory energy, like a curse. We began recording the album just before Arthur died and completed it shortly after, and I haven’t listened to the record properly since - I prefer not to go back there. I remember it as such a raw, unadorned and desolate thing. Songs like ‘Jesus Alone’, ‘Magneto’, ‘Anthracene’, and ‘Girl in Amber’ felt like they possessed a malevolent force at their core, foreshadowing the devastation that would visit my home. The song ‘Skeleton Tree’ itself was added later. It was the first song I wrote after Arthur’s death, so it was with some trepidation that I listened to it to check on your supposed mishearing of the lyrics.
I played the song and was genuinely surprised by how lovely it was - a gorgeous, lilting piano line and a beautiful vocal melody resting on a strange, mismatched chord structure. It is full of demonic imagery, yet also beautiful - A jittery TV glowing white like fire. The title, ‘Skeleton Tree’, was a bleak crucifixion image, the tree upon which no one is redeemed. It is a desperate song, filled with desperate images from a desperate time, yet touched with feelings of hope that I could not begin to see back then. As I listened, I thought of you, Russell, new to grief, navigating a life without your partner, a life you did not anticipate or choose - a father dying daily in sacrificial love for his beautiful children. Your reading of the lyric was correct.
I call out, I call out
Right across the sea
But the echo comes back empty
Nothing is for free
Ultimately, I found the echo I had thought to be empty was not empty at all, it was simply drowned in the roar of grief. As the grief retreated, I came to understand that the presence of the departed resonated through those left behind. Your children, Russell, carry their mother in their bones, in their souls and in their cells, the maternal bond never truly severed.
When I wrote ‘Skeleton Tree’, I could not perceive any hope in the song at all. It was a vacuum, all nihilism and void. Listening to it now, years later, I can hear its insistent beauty loud and clear. The echo is not empty, Russell, not in the slightest - we call out, and given time, the echo comes back bearing the entirety of the world.
Love, Nick
ISSUE #317 / March 2025 CRUCIFIED TREE FORM - THE AGONY BY THEYRE LEE-ELLIOT, 1959
I was recently listening to Skeleton Tree and realised all these years I’d misheard one of your lyrics.
I always heard…’but the echo comes back EMPTY.’
This line always struck a chord in my heart. I’d recently lost my wife to cancer, left to cope with two beautiful young children and I often imagined calling across the water to her but the echo coming back empty.
I’d never dare suggest that my lyric is better, but would you agree that it might be almost as good as yours?
RUSSELL, CHELSMFORD, USA
Dear Russell,
A dark cloud hangs over the album Skeleton Tree. I have always felt it to be a record that possessed a shocking, premonitory energy, like a curse. We began recording the album just before Arthur died and completed it shortly after, and I haven’t listened to the record properly since - I prefer not to go back there. I remember it as such a raw, unadorned and desolate thing. Songs like ‘Jesus Alone’, ‘Magneto’, ‘Anthracene’, and ‘Girl in Amber’ felt like they possessed a malevolent force at their core, foreshadowing the devastation that would visit my home. The song ‘Skeleton Tree’ itself was added later. It was the first song I wrote after Arthur’s death, so it was with some trepidation that I listened to it to check on your supposed mishearing of the lyrics.
I played the song and was genuinely surprised by how lovely it was - a gorgeous, lilting piano line and a beautiful vocal melody resting on a strange, mismatched chord structure. It is full of demonic imagery, yet also beautiful - A jittery TV glowing white like fire. The title, ‘Skeleton Tree’, was a bleak crucifixion image, the tree upon which no one is redeemed. It is a desperate song, filled with desperate images from a desperate time, yet touched with feelings of hope that I could not begin to see back then. As I listened, I thought of you, Russell, new to grief, navigating a life without your partner, a life you did not anticipate or choose - a father dying daily in sacrificial love for his beautiful children. Your reading of the lyric was correct.
I call out, I call out
Right across the sea
But the echo comes back empty
Nothing is for free
Ultimately, I found the echo I had thought to be empty was not empty at all, it was simply drowned in the roar of grief. As the grief retreated, I came to understand that the presence of the departed resonated through those left behind. Your children, Russell, carry their mother in their bones, in their souls and in their cells, the maternal bond never truly severed.
When I wrote ‘Skeleton Tree’, I could not perceive any hope in the song at all. It was a vacuum, all nihilism and void. Listening to it now, years later, I can hear its insistent beauty loud and clear. The echo is not empty, Russell, not in the slightest - we call out, and given time, the echo comes back bearing the entirety of the world.
Love, Nick
-
sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
nick cave plays at memorial service for marianne faithful
...A memorial service for the singer Marianne Faithfull was held at St Mary’s Church in Aldworth, the Berkshire village where Marianne’s late mother, Baroness Erisso, lived. Marianne was buried immediately afterwards, next to her mother, in the churchyard...
Ringo Starr, Bob Geldof and Kate Moss attended. Keith Richards and Marianne Faithfull’s ex-boyfriend Mick Jagger sent flowers.
The service was conducted by the Rev Grant Fensome, the Church of England vicar, assisted by Father Tom Montgomery, a Catholic priest who often visited Marianne in her last years. She was brought up as a Catholic.
A musical tribute was played by rock singer Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, Ed Harcourt and Rob McVey...
https://www.theoldie.co.uk/blog/memoria ... -1946-2025
------------------
Watch an exclusive clip of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis’ ‘This Much I Know To Be True’ featuring Marianne Faithfull
https://www.nme.com/news/music/watch-ex ... ll-3238083
Ringo Starr, Bob Geldof and Kate Moss attended. Keith Richards and Marianne Faithfull’s ex-boyfriend Mick Jagger sent flowers.
The service was conducted by the Rev Grant Fensome, the Church of England vicar, assisted by Father Tom Montgomery, a Catholic priest who often visited Marianne in her last years. She was brought up as a Catholic.
A musical tribute was played by rock singer Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, Ed Harcourt and Rob McVey...
https://www.theoldie.co.uk/blog/memoria ... -1946-2025
------------------
Watch an exclusive clip of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis’ ‘This Much I Know To Be True’ featuring Marianne Faithfull
https://www.nme.com/news/music/watch-ex ... ll-3238083
Re: Nick Cave
Hi Abby ~
I've just read the letter exchange between Russell and Nick Cave. I'm profoundly moved by the depth and empathy of Nick's meaningful and extremely detailed response to Nick... not only giving him historical information on the album itself, but relating it to his own responses to the listening of it, and ultimately applying it in so intimate a way to Russell's own personal situation and description of the lyric's impact on him. To think that Nick was prompted by Russell's letter to his listening to it for the first time since its original recording is amazing. Nick's response to Russell is a Masters Class on how to genuinely respond with heart to a fan. What Nick wrote is how I've tried to look at the literal DNA realities when I've sought self comfort in the loss of my beloved mother (my father, too, but it was triggered by my grief when I lost my mother). I hope Russell framed this exchange for safekeeping and for the sake of his daughters. Thank you so much for sharing it here. I never would have seen it otherwise, as I'm not a Nick Cave follower. This letter sure reveals his character and worthiness as a person in how he chose to respond to Russell, as well as to offer Russell (*and* his daughters), in addition to himself, very real hope. There's so much that happened in these two letters.
I'm curious as to what Russell thought the lyric actually was. When I read his supposed misinterpretation, I thought that it sure had to be better than Nick's original because I couldn't imagine anything topping his mishearing.
And then for his signing it "Love, Nick," as though he were responding to a personal friend, underscored everything he'd just so genuinely said.
All the best,
Lizzie
I've just read the letter exchange between Russell and Nick Cave. I'm profoundly moved by the depth and empathy of Nick's meaningful and extremely detailed response to Nick... not only giving him historical information on the album itself, but relating it to his own responses to the listening of it, and ultimately applying it in so intimate a way to Russell's own personal situation and description of the lyric's impact on him. To think that Nick was prompted by Russell's letter to his listening to it for the first time since its original recording is amazing. Nick's response to Russell is a Masters Class on how to genuinely respond with heart to a fan. What Nick wrote is how I've tried to look at the literal DNA realities when I've sought self comfort in the loss of my beloved mother (my father, too, but it was triggered by my grief when I lost my mother). I hope Russell framed this exchange for safekeeping and for the sake of his daughters. Thank you so much for sharing it here. I never would have seen it otherwise, as I'm not a Nick Cave follower. This letter sure reveals his character and worthiness as a person in how he chose to respond to Russell, as well as to offer Russell (*and* his daughters), in addition to himself, very real hope. There's so much that happened in these two letters.
I'm curious as to what Russell thought the lyric actually was. When I read his supposed misinterpretation, I thought that it sure had to be better than Nick's original because I couldn't imagine anything topping his mishearing.
And then for his signing it "Love, Nick," as though he were responding to a personal friend, underscored everything he'd just so genuinely said.
All the best,
Lizzie
"Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken."
~ Oscar Wilde
~ Oscar Wilde
-
sebmelmoth2003
- Posts: 1186
- Joined: Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:41 pm
nick cave donates books to hove charity shop
A Hove charity bookshop has received a donation from a world famous rock star.
Oxfam on Blatchington Road in Hove received a donation of around 2,000 books from Nick Cave’s personal collection.
https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/2531576 ... store-hove
https://www.oxfam.org.uk/shops/oxfam-shop-hove
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hove
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nick is also a possible candidate to become the next archbishop of canterbury
https://www.anglicanfutures.org/post/32 ... canterbury
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anyone visiting south-east england might also be interested in visiting this giant 2nd-hand bookshop.
camilla's in eastbourne.
https://x.com/achuka/status/1946174002705105263
https://www.camillasbookshop.com
Oxfam on Blatchington Road in Hove received a donation of around 2,000 books from Nick Cave’s personal collection.
https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/2531576 ... store-hove
https://www.oxfam.org.uk/shops/oxfam-shop-hove
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hove
-----------
nick is also a possible candidate to become the next archbishop of canterbury
https://www.anglicanfutures.org/post/32 ... canterbury
--------------
anyone visiting south-east england might also be interested in visiting this giant 2nd-hand bookshop.
camilla's in eastbourne.
https://x.com/achuka/status/1946174002705105263
https://www.camillasbookshop.com