Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Push the Sky Away
- Written by Paul Stephen Gettings
We must admit, we'd kind of thought we'd heard it all from Nick Cave here at Muso's Guide.
Something-teen albums down the line under one moniker or another, we've heard him scream about strippers, we've heard him let love in, we've heard him murder ballads (get it? Just kidding, he did a good job …) and we've heard him thrash and grind. But this fourteenth album proper with The Bad Seeds, Push the Sky Away, has something different going on. All the familiar elements are here, but it has another dimension to it, a different tone, that makes it entirely unique in the Nick Cave canon.
Lead single and opening track 'We No Who U R' was an intriguing offering upon its arrival in the first days of this year. We've heard Cave being threatening before, but never like this. A gentle, modest ballad with just a touch of eeriness to it, there's a terrifying inevitability to the almost peaceful delivery of the lines "And we know who you are/And we know where you live/And we know there’s no need to forgive". Second single 'Jubilee Street' is more euphoric, featuring an irresistible, chiming guitar that slowly builds up to a crescendo as Cave sings of closed doors and grim consequences on the streets of London.
It's hard to tell if 'We Real Cool' is a reference to the 1959 Gwendolyn Brooks poem of the same name, but it certainly fits in well with Push the Sky Away. The threat of violence, an indifference to danger and the inevitability of death are themes writ large in both works, the song itself has a beautiful, elegiac, haunting melody, but beneath it all a low-slung bass rumbles with barely restrained menace. Title track 'Push the Sky Away' strikes a similar mood as a ghostly organ whirrs and leads us to the album's close.
'Finishing Jubilee Street' is another downbeat slink, with the strikingly meta opening line "I'd just finished writing 'Jubilee Street'/I laid down on my bed and fell into a deep sleep/And when I awoke, I believed I'd taken a bride called Mary Stanford" that confuses as much as it amuses. What is clear by this point is just how tight the performances on this album are. Cave himself is as arresting as he was all those years ago when The Birthday Party first came crashing from across the Indian Ocean, but the supporting cast here are also fantastic. Languid, subtle guitars are held aloft on a bed of sparse, muffled percussion as eerie PJ Harvey-esque backing croons haunt every chorus.
Although Push the Sky Away has all the trademark elements we know and love about Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds present and correct, this album is a still a testament to the art of reinvention. The band have twisted and teased their sound into new moods and sonic territories, and produced something that not only feels unique in the context of Nick Cave's career but also stands up as one of its best moments.
Push the Sky away is out now and available from amazon