Nick Cave and the Bad Seed Reissues : From Her To Eternity, The Firstborn is Dead, Kicking Against The Pricks, Your Funeral…My Trial :: Review

By greg on May 17, 2012 in Featured Reviews, Tunes with 1 Comment

After the Birthday Party broke up in 1983, singer Nick Cave assembled the Bad Seeds, a post-punk super group of sorts featuring ex Birthday Party guitarist Mick Harvey on drums, ex Magazine bassist Barry Adamson and Einsturzende Neubaten guitarist Blixa Bargeld. With the group complete, Cave toned down the raucous noise of his former band and perfected his take on blues, rock, post punk art and gospel. Cave’s lyrics remained pitch black but attained a more literary tone as his writing skills developed. Taking a cue from Leonard Cohen, Cave brought his dark tales of love and lust to a wider audience.

Mute Records will be releasing Nick Cave & The Bad Seed’s first four albums “From Her To Eternity, The Firstborn Is Dead, Kicking Against The Pricks and Your Funeral…My Trial” on May 5, 2009 and I have been lucky to hear the remastered albums. Where once these albums sounded slight on CD, the sound has been beefed up for these reissues. On the old CDs the instrumentation was very muddy and dense, and the vocal clarity was awful, now every strum of the guitar is sharp and the rhythm section pops. The original track listing has also been reinstated with bonus tracks being placed on a separate disc so you can hear the album as it was intended.

On his first album with the Bad Seeds, “From Her To Eternity,” Cave opens the album with the ominous cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Avalanche.” Cave’s take on this song sets the tone for the remainder of the album. “From Her To Eternity” is an album thick on atmosphere as the feeling of dread never lets up. Cave sings like a man possessed on “Cabin Fever” and like the hellhounds are on his trail on “From Her To Eternity.” Cave further cemented his reputation as heir to Cohen and Scott Walker with tracks like, “Well of Misery” and “A Box For Black Paul.” Twenty-five years after its initial release, “From Her To Eternity” is still uneasy listening.

“The Firstborn Is Dead” can be seen as Nick Cave’s Americana album as it reflects Cave’s adopted love of the blues and also pays homage to the battered blues of Skip James and Charley Patton. The blues seemed like perfect fodder for Nick Cave’s songwriting with its imagery of floods, unfulfilled love, lust and death. “The Firstborn Is Dead” takes you on a rain swept journey to where Elvis Presley was born in “Tupelo.” Cave almost affects an Elvis like croon at points in the song as The Bad Seeds percussively mimic the jaunty ride of a train. Train imagery is again echoed in “Train Long – Suffering” a reverb drenched song of lost love. “The Firstborn is Dead” is an album that shows a more subtle and reverential side of Cave, a side Cave continues to explore in his soundtrack work with fellow Bad Seed Warren Ellis.

Continuing with themes covered on “The Firstborn is Dead,” “Kicking Against The Pricks” is Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds all covers album. On the album, Cave’s choices of songs are impeccable with songs by John Lee Hooker (“I’m Gonna Kill That Woman,”) Leadbelly (“Black Betty,”) Velvet Underground (“All Tomorrow’s Parties”), meshed along with standards like “Long Black Veil.” The Bad Seeds also sound cracking as a covers band, breathing life into songs that by the 1980’s were considered slightly moldy.

After various line up changes with The Bad Seeds and the triumphant “Kicking Against The Pricks,” the Bad Seeds reconvened on the more refined “Your Funeral…My Trial.” “Your Funeral…My Trial” seems concerned with taking a reflective view of crumbling love affairs and is almost wholly original save for the masterful cover of Tim Rose’s “Long Time Man.” On this album, the Bad Seeds are more of a controlled force less reliant on the wild and wooly thrash of the past. The Bad Seeds reflect a meditative tone on opening lament “Sad Waters.” The cabaret atmosphere of “The Carny” and “She Fell Away” accentuates Cave’s tales of love gone horribly wrong while providing the backbone of further attempts at the genre. “Your Funeral…My Trial” remains the most current sounding iteration of Cave’s back catalog and should be the place to start for those unfamiliar with these albums, which coincidentally are all worthy of picking up. The Nick Cave reissue campaign succeeds immensely and helps illuminate light on one of rock’s dark princes.

From Her To Eternity

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