Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - The Boatman's Call

After a career spent tearing down the world with horror and disgust, Nick Cave finally sounds ready to start rebuilding from scratch. He's begun to find a quiet grace, and perhaps even beauty, past all the darkness that's long consumed him. Amid the ashes of a world unable to exorcise its demons, Cave actually finds love; a strange, twisted, doomed love, perhaps--but love nevertheless.

On The Boatman's Call, Cave's latest collection, the singer-songwriter finds room for the personal, the spiritual, and even the hopeful in his grey psyche. With only the sparest accompaniment--often just a piano or organ, light percussion, and violin (care of Dirty Three's Warren Ellis)--Cave employs traditional folk song structure and simplicity to weave tales saddened less through tragedy as through emptiness. Songs like "Into My Arms" and "(Are You) The One That I've Been Waiting For?" are among Cave's most self-assured and soulful to date. Stripped down and grown up--though still ghoulish and grave--Cave the storyteller has turned into something of a vampire Springsteen.

Ultimately, The Boatman's Call sounds like Cave's attempt to poison his cake and eat it too. For a record so resolute in its denial of divinity, The Boatman's Call's obsession with religious themes and imagery might seem contradictory if they hadn't come from someone like Cave, who fancies himself a fallen angel searching for a ladder back to heaven. Where Gothic meets cathedral, there resides, for better or worse, our dark saint Nick. --Roni Sarig Amazon.com essential recording

The Boatman's Call

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds-The Boatman's Call ****

More stripped and raw than his previous work. Less accompaniment than ever before; which is both good and bad. Sometimes less is more, but there are places here which could benefit greatly from more of a backing.

Though it has something to say for it, The Boatman's Call. This is refreshing in all meaning of the term. When originally released in 1997 this was like a new start for Cave. Unlike anything else he had ever released and yet it sounded more like him than almost anything he had ever released previous. His influences are more prominent as well, hearing Tom Waits more than ever but with an injection of post VU Lou Reed.

'Into My Arms' ushers in the album very much like Patti Smith did Horses. "I don't believe in an interventionist God/ But I know, darling, that you do.." Dark, and warm, almost down playing Smiths take on 'Gloria.' 'Lime-Tree Arbour' feel anxious while 'Black Hair' as subdued as it is would have been right at home on Reed's own New York. 'Green Eyes' closes leaving more to be wanted as it should.

The Boatman's Call is a rare work in such an artists canon. Cave would try to recapture this again on following releases but to no avail. This, his most personal work lets us in to a doomed existence, or what he wants us to believe is a doomed existence, but one with quit and crawling grace. And for that, The Boatman's Call is vital. July 8, 2008

An Antti Keisala Comment: Blessed In The Spirit

It's becoming somewhat of an old saying amongst the fans that Nick Cave is incapable of making bad music. When he records, it's either amazing or heavenly. This is, in my books and in those of many, the most heavenly alongside "No More Shall We Part". Say, look for the triptych consisting of the two aforementioned albums and "Abattoir Blues/Lyre of Orpheus" and you have a pretty remarkable retrospective.

As has been pointed out, whereas "Shall We Part" is a collection of songs with ellaborate compositions such as the spine-tingling "Love Letter", the precedant doesn't appear as immediate. "Into My Arms", a song into which you might bump in rather unexpected places, couldn't be more of an introspectivel minimalistic opener: it's a whirlwind of emotions, limpid (that is, I'm using the word as understood as serene, calm) rising to high heavens. Each of the songs builds upon the one that precedes the other. There's a solitary sorrow in songs such as "Lime-Tree Arbour", "People Ain't No Good" and "Where Do We Go Now But Nowhere", yet solemn and quiet grace in "Brompton Oratory", "There Is A Kingdom" and "(Are You) The One I've Been Waiting For?", a triptych that shapes the middle of the album, and to my ears and soul the climax of the album. There is truth in that experience, beauty that's impossible to define and to believe. "Green Eyes" aptly ends the album, again of the highlights of a career.

This is an album to which you can wrap yourself around, ease the stop from your throat and lull for and by yourself. Spiritual sadness has never sounded and felt so good.

With best regards,
AK April 2, 2007

Beauty, Truth & Grace

Nick Cave is in my opinion the most fascinating living songwriter other than perhaps Tom Waites, PJ Harvey or Bjork......

But let me get back to Nick - this album is simply magical. The more I listen to The Boatman's Call the more I am drawn into a magical world of love, tenderness & sadness. I just love this album & it may be my very favorite of Cave's (but then I dearly love Henry's Dream, Let Love In etc...).

I purchased this CD as soon as it was released & it was an epiphany of what music can & should be. The lassitude & longing in Brompton Oratory & Far From Me hypnotize & haunt me. Into My Arms fills me with a blissful loving feeling (I confess that sometimes I cry when I listen to it). Even my musician partner loves this tune (he loves that I cry listening to it too - he says that girls should cry to songs like this). :) He first believed he didn't care for Cave but this album has changed all of that.

I write this review while unpacking over the past several weeks. One of the great things about moving is the re-discovering of things past. All my tenderly loved books, music & even articls of clothing which I had forgotten about. All seem like good friends. Cave especially because I always have a feeling of "re-remembering" when listening to Cave.

Living in a foreign country is so interesting for me & I enjoy discovering what singers, artists & writers are popular. I am not surprised that so many of the French I have met all know & admire Nick Cave. It was rare for me to meet anyone in the US who even knew who he was! let alone someone I could discuss his music with. I've also found that the Italians are crazy for Cave. His sensibilities (even with his rock-a-billy Elvis homage) are much more old world troubadour than modern rock star.

For me, Nick Cave is like a mad monk shining his lantern & illumining the way for those who wish to follow along his rocky journey. For me I hear a beautiful message & see the light of a gorgeous vista which a large portion of the rest of the world doesn't believe in & I suppose believes is mad. This message is that even though this world sometimes seems dark & unbearable Love is the power & light of all life - there is nothing greater.

Amen March 12, 2007

Alas, no masterpiece from the master

Sometimes a record, book or movie comes out that seems to get everybody excited but me. For some reason I fail to see what's so good about it. The critical praise amazes me as much as it irritates me.
Nick Cave is my idol, icon and favorite mad preacher. I've tried on amazon.com here to express my feeling toward most of his albums. Most of them I liked, liked very much actually, and there really are just a few things Nick can do wrong.

But with "The boatman's call" he does menage to completely disappoint me. A range of twelve introvert ballads are offered here, and there is not one I really care about. Not one that moves me, and believe me, Nick Cave has sung some ballads that really got underneath my skin. "Mercy" on the "Tender prey" album, "Stranger than kindness" on "Your funeral... my trial", even with his former band, the punk act The Birthday Party, he offered some really moving low-key songs like "Jeniffer's veil" and "Several sins".

In 1994 Nick came with the sublime "Let love in", which would be the album with the most perfect blend of manic burst-out songs and paced ballads like the sing-along title track and the beautiful and echoing "Do you love me (Part 2)".

Next output was the inky black "Murder ballads", and although it was very tongue-in-cheek, it still offered us some catchy slow songs like "Song of Joy" and the P.J. Harvey duet "Henry Lee".

But is was in 2001 that one of Nick's most marvelous albums saw the light of day: "No more shall we part". All ballads, no rock songs. But the songs here all had something unique and harsh.
Deeply rooted blackness and anxiety were made into songs of everlasting beauty.
Nick Cave surprises with each song, like with the rainy piano-guided opener "As I sad sadly by her side", with the Godfearing whisper on "God is in the house", the female choir during the coda of "Hallelujah", the tender but haunting "Sweetheart come" and with "The sorrowful wife", on which he does loses his temper for a brief moment and cries out in vein.

For some reason every song hit the bull's eye and therefor I cannot understand why "The boatman's call", released between the gem "No more shall we part" and the other two winners, "Let love in" and "Murder ballads", is such a let down.

But hey, everybody else is cheering, so maybe, just maybe, it's just me.

June 26, 2006

Who is this guy, Elvis?

So I saw The Proposition on Friday and bought this album Saturday. The music in the film was great and the screenwriting was tight as well so I started reading some reviews for his albums. Apparently I'm jumping on some kind of bandwagon. So be it, I hope we have a good driver.

I am a hardcore Tom Waits fan so this is definitely my taste.
The first time I listened to it it felt a bit cheesy but it is quickly gaining my respect.

Went ahead and bought the rest of albums so I have yet to know if this these are his style limitations or if this is his best. June 2, 2006

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