Album Review//Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - Push The Sky Away
In an age where the double numbers are rarely reached in terms of album numbers, this is the fifteenth album from Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds. The man who famously likes to tell music journalists that certain questions are 'none of your fucking business' is in a sonically mellow mood this time around and we reviewed it for your pleasure.
If a record cover tells a story then the tale weaved by the intriguing cover art to Push The Sky Away, the fifteenth album from Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds must be a good one. A slightly disgruntled looking Nick Cave appears to show an anonymous lady wearing nothing the door in a suitably off white studio and if you look at the artwork whilst listening to the music you might get the story.
The album as a whole is noticeably mellower than the often pleasantly ear destroying melodies of the band and it's a joy to listen in the darkest way. Tracks like Jubilee Street are dark tales of, in this case, sex and humanity, and it's ripe with choice lines like 'I got a fetus on a leash'. The lush strings are an absolute highlight, ascending the songs subject into a heavenly flight of sheer beauty, sharing a quiet but persistent beauty also found in We No Who U R, the albums lead song.
Indeed, with only nine songs and a perfectly bittersweet aura floating over the whole album it's a listen that is lush with melody and full of nervous tension. There's the heavy bass of classic 'Bad Seeds on the brooding We Real Cool, with the vocals almost bursting with an explosive fury that is barely tempered by the strings. There's a neat fourth wall moment on Finishing Jubilee Street, seemingly about the moment the fourth track, Jubilee Street was finally finished. A dream like melody envelops the spoken word lyrics, at times resembling a more threatening Patti Smith song-poem.
By the time we reach the funereal tones of the title track we can understand why Nick Cave himself has described the album as 'a ghost baby in the incubator'. We can only hope that the poor girl being chastised on the cover was being sent to buy a copy post haste...
Reviewed by Sebastian Gahan.
The album as a whole is noticeably mellower than the often pleasantly ear destroying melodies of the band and it's a joy to listen in the darkest way. Tracks like Jubilee Street are dark tales of, in this case, sex and humanity, and it's ripe with choice lines like 'I got a fetus on a leash'. The lush strings are an absolute highlight, ascending the songs subject into a heavenly flight of sheer beauty, sharing a quiet but persistent beauty also found in We No Who U R, the albums lead song.
Indeed, with only nine songs and a perfectly bittersweet aura floating over the whole album it's a listen that is lush with melody and full of nervous tension. There's the heavy bass of classic 'Bad Seeds on the brooding We Real Cool, with the vocals almost bursting with an explosive fury that is barely tempered by the strings. There's a neat fourth wall moment on Finishing Jubilee Street, seemingly about the moment the fourth track, Jubilee Street was finally finished. A dream like melody envelops the spoken word lyrics, at times resembling a more threatening Patti Smith song-poem.
By the time we reach the funereal tones of the title track we can understand why Nick Cave himself has described the album as 'a ghost baby in the incubator'. We can only hope that the poor girl being chastised on the cover was being sent to buy a copy post haste...
Reviewed by Sebastian Gahan.
