Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds

My friends have been bugging me more recently that I need to write more blogs. And what do you know, I went to a concert the other night, so I guess I actually have something to write about. The show took place at The Warfield, which was originally built in 1922 as a vaudeville theater. It is quite a cool venue, holding approximately 2500 people. It's a great place for shows, and many bands have played there over the years, ranging from the Grateful Dead to the Clash to Fall Out Boy to Dimmu Borgir.

The concert was opened by a band called Red Sparowes, which I can only describe as metal jazz. It ranged from hard and heavy to very spacey, and each song was probably 5-8 minutes long. They were on stage for 40 minutes and never spoke a word the entire time. The songs were all instrumental. They had a screen behind them, on which was displayed a film of various images, mostly black and white, ranging from Chinese military officers executing blindfolded prisoners, to clouds in the sky, to beetles crawling on a skull, to flowers in a field, etc. All in all, I thought they were pretty decent.

Then came the main act, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Man, what a great show. He was fantastic for a number of reasons. In fact, here are 20 reasons why the show was excellent:

1. Night of the Lotus Eaters
2. Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
3. Tupelo
4. Today’s Lesson
5. Red Right Hand
6. I Let Love In
7. When Numbers Get Serious
8. Mercy Seat
9. Deanna
10. Moonland
11. The Ship Song
12. We Call Upon the Author
13. Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry
14. More News From Nowhere

Encore:
15. The Lyre of Orpheus
16. Into My Arms
17. Get Ready For Love
18. Hard On for Love
19. God is in the House
20. Stagger Lee

Probably the easiest way to talk about this show is to go song by song and talk about what I remember, and then maybe say a few more words at the end.

1. Night of the Lotus Eaters. This was a great way to start the show. It was darker and heavier than the album version of this song, which I thought was fantastic. "Get ready to shield yourself!" over and over. This is probably one of my favorite songs from the album, and this version was even better. In fact, none of the songs in this concert were played quite the same way they are on the albums. Each one is unique.

2. Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! If you look up the music video for this song, you can see basically what Nick Cave looked like, except he had his jacket open and his shirt unbuttoned about 4 or 5 inches farther down. He was wearing a gold chain with a medallion. He looked like a pimp. There was, of course, extra cheering when he sung about the "sweet San Franciscan girl."

3. Tupelo. This is a song that I don't know too well, but it was really cool. The lighting effects really set the mood well. Dark blues, with a few small spotlights going around, like lighthouse lights, with occasional bright flashes of light. He introduced many of the songs before he played them. In this case, he said "This is a song about a storm." Someone in the audience yells something that I can't really hear. He points to them and says, "Exactly! ... A big storm. A terrible storm." Throughout the show, there was a lot of interaction between him and the audience. He would sing directly to the people in the front row, and point to them and stuff. And the audience would yell things between songs (most of which I couldn't understand at all) and he would respond. Usually with comments like "What?" and "I can't understand a word you're saying!" At one point, someone yelled something, presumably a song request (unfortunately, I didn't hear what it was), and he said something like, "No! Please! If I could just go back and erase that song from the history books..." At another point, somebody yelled something and he said, "We can do that one, but not right now!"

4. Today's Lesson. "We're gonna have a real cool time tonight." Very appropriate lyric for the night.

5. Red Right Hand. This was introduced with "Here's a song about ... the usual stuff ..." It was a very cool rendition of the song. In the words of Jim Harrington, it was "almost lounge-like, a new and different arrangement with a crazy build up toward the middle and nothing else but a wall of sound toward the end. It was startling, different." I think he almost forgot part of the lyrics near the start. At the start of the second verse, he kinda hesitated for a moment while the band kept playing, ran back to his keyboard and grabbed a piece of paper, looked at it real quick then dropped it, and rushed through the rest of the line to get caught up with the band. It was pretty funny. He also played around with the lyrics just a little bit, singing "Don't got no money? He'll get you some. You don't like that shitty old car you're driving? He'll get you a different one. You ain't got no self-respect, feel like a fucking insect? Well don't worry buddy cause here he comes."

6. I Let Love In. Another song I didn't know. Very cool though. Really intense. Heavy and anthem-y.

7. When Numbers Get Serious. I don't know this song at all, and don't really remember anything about it. As far as I can tell from Google, it's a Paul Simon and/or Simon & Garfunkel song.

8. The Mercy Seat. I don't remember exactly how he introduced this song, but it was something along the lines of "We're going to play a song that's very difficult, vocally. Lots of different parts. [or something like that. Sorry, I really don't remember his exact words.] It's called The Mercy Seat." It was very cool. He really seemed to "feel" the lyrics to this. At the end, he repeated the refrain "But I'm afraid I told a lie" probably three or four times.

9. Deanna. Nick Cave isn't down here in San Francisco for my love or my money. He wants my soul.

10. Moonland. "This is a song about driving in a car. Going this way, and that way, and ... stuff." Another great performance. He really gets into it, quiets the whole band down as he sings about listening to the whispering DJ on the radio, and then bursting with sound and energy as he scrings (that's a combination of sings and screams) "I'm not your favorite lover! I'm not your favorite lover!"

11. The Ship Song. As the Bad Seeds started playing this song, Nick ran offstage. He was offstage for maybe 30 seconds at the most, and ran back on with his hand up to his nose. He got to the microphone just in time, just as the band finished playing the song's intro and got to the first verse. There was another point earlier in the show, between songs, that he ran offstage for 30 seconds or so. Make of this what you will. I'll just point out here that throughout the show, Nick was very high energy, dancing and strutting around the stage, throwing tambourines aside when he was finished with them, dropping his keyboard sheet music onto the floor when he was finished with that page, knocking over his mike stand multiple times, and grabbing his microphone cord and just YANKING when it would get caught as he moved around. This kept the roadies very busy; they were always running out to set his mike stand back up or straighten out his cord or whatever.

12. We Call Upon the Author. I don't remember his exact words to introduce this song, but it was along the lines of, "The answer to all you'll ever need to know flows through the very veins of this song." This is probably a good time to mention his violinist, Warren Ellis. (No, not that Warren Ellis.) He was very cool. He looks kinda old and grizzly, with a wild beard and hair. He would be at home on Telegraph. He had two different violins and three (I think) instruments that I really couldn't figure out what they were. They basically looked like Stratocaster guitars, but much smaller. They were probably a third the size of a guitar. Maybe they were electric mandolins or something? I have no idea. Anyway, I bring him up now because during this song, he didn't play any of his string instruments. Instead, he played an electronic loopy thingy. It looked like a guitar footpedal, but instead of playing it with his feet, he sat down on the stage and played it with his hands. When he wasn't actively playing it, he was sitting on the ground, staring up into space, pinwheeling his arms around, like a tripping guru. It was pretty entertaining.

13. Papa Won't Leave You, Henry. Another one I didn't really know at all, but was very cool.

14. More News From Nowhere. A pretty good "ending" to a fantastic show. Kinda mellow, compared to the earlier intensity. Ends with the lyrics, "Well, I've got to say Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye."

Encore
15. The Lyre of Orpheus. They took their sweet time coming back on stage. When they did, Nick said, "I'm going to sing a song that requires a bit more audience participation. When I say 'Oh Mama,' I need you all to say 'Oh Mama.' Afterwards." He then launched into this chilling rendition of The Lyre of Orpheus. It was kinda funny, at a couple points he stopped singing at the 'Oh Mama' part, I think to see what the audience would do, and sure enough, the audience "echoed" his nonexistent 'Oh Mama's.

16. Into My Arms. This is such a lovely, sweet song, and he did such a fine job with it. Most of the band left the stage for this one. It was just Nick Cave on the keyboard and vocals, and two other guys providing minimal accompaniment on drums and acoustic guitar.

17. Get Ready For Love. I think people were expecting the show to be about over now, and were happily surprised that it was not yet. There was some weird thing right at the start of the song where one of the roadies took the microphone from it's stand and started leaving stage with it, just as the band started playing and Nick went to sing. So he grabbed the roadie, who set the mike back in its stand, in time for Nick to sing the second line of the song, although he missed the first.

18. Hard On For Love. He kinda paused before this song for a few moments, while audience members yelling stuff. He said "What?" which of course only increased the general chaos of the noise. So then he said something about not being able to understand a word of what anyone was saying, and the audience sort of quieted down. There were a few moments where the audience was quiet, looking at him, and he was quiet, looking at us, when this guy in the audience broke the silence by yelling loudly and clearly, "STAGGER LEE!!!" To which Nick responded, "No, no, we've already done that song. How about Hard On For Love?!" So he played that. Another song I don't really know, but it was pretty good.

19. God Is In the House. If I remember right, before this song, he asked, "What do you want to hear?" and this time, the entire audience, basically in unison, shouted "STAGGER LEE!!" and Nick just said something like, "No, no," before heading over to the keyboard, sitting down, and starting to play this song. This was another one like "Into My Arms," with just Nick and two other guys. As he got near the end of the song, he started having a bit of difficulty with the lyrics, pausing at one point and laughing a little bit. Then he sings something like, "If we all could hold hands and ... shout ... [laughing] Sorry, it's been a while since we've played this one! If we could all hold hands and get it on and shout Hallelujah, and ... [laughing some more] God is in the house!" slowing down and dragging out the last line, and bringing the keyboard's chord progression nearly to the end, but instead of playing the last chord, he did a "run" up the entire keyboard from low to high, then just banged his hands down into whatever random notes he hit. It was pretty funny.

20. Stagger Lee. And finally, Stagger Lee, the song we were all waiting to hear. He did not disappoint. He sang with a raw intensity, pantomimed the shootings, and finished the show with just as much energy and intensity he displayed throughout.

All in all, it was fantastic, and I would recommend his concerts to anyone who is at all into this type of music. He played for about 5-10 minutes short of two hours (I think), and we got out in time to catch the last BART back to the East Bay.

P.S. I think one of the reasons I don't write more blogs is that it takes so bloody much time to say anything! I feel that I can probably express myself better in writing than I can speaking, but it just takes so much time to get it all out, and I have other ways in which I want to fill my time. ;-) That said, I don't know when I'll post next, but I'm sure this will not be the last.

P.P.S. Here's a thought - give me ideas of things to write about, and maybe, perhaps, I'll write more blogs. No guarantees, but maybe. Also, post comments so I know I'm not speaking into a vacuum. But I can't really complain if you don't, since I rarely if ever comment on my friend's blogs.