Will Russell reviews the first show of Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds’ two-night run at the 3Arena
To paraphrase Rilke, ‘There is such a music as God and Nick Cave borders it’. An august quote, sure, but one that utterly captures the territory that Cave is treading, an elder statesman of rock and roll showmanship, chewing the ground that Elvis, Bowie and Simone paved before him. Aye, he is that damn good.
Cave has referred to his new album Wild God, which he covers almost in entirety tonight, as “songs of conversion” – and surveying the ramp that runs along the delirious baying mob of the 3Arena audience, he has amassed a convocation of converts. He’s sure brought the firepower – half a dozen Bad Seeds in swell loose-fitting suits and a quartet of silver-cloaked Gospel singers cast over a triple-tiered stage, TCB style. It’s quite the spectacle, which the head buck cat Seed tops in perfectly tailored clobber, thin as a rake, hair black as a raven.
The opening salvo is a trio of Wild God tracks and into ‘Frogs’ we heave, and you sense it is a long-awaited anticipation that erupts across all assembled. The Seeds wade into it and it’s as mighty as an encore. For the title track, Nick sits at the grand piano, which dominates centre stage, for the first time – guitarist George Vjestica to his right and the indomitable Warren Ellis sat at his left-hand side in a den of amps, instruments and wonderful chaos. Cave springs onto the ramp, evangelically beseeching: “Cause I’m a wild god flying and a wild god swimming/And an old sick god dying and crying and singing/Bring your spirit down!” and Dublin is ecstatic.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds at 3Arena. Copyright Jason Doherty.
‘Song of the Lake’ completes the Wild God opening trio – Colin Greenwood, he of the parish of Radiohead, locked into the majesty of drummer Larry Mullins, while Cave relates the crooked fairytale: “Oh, never mind, never mind, never mind/Cause all the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put us back together again.”
Introducing ‘O Children’, he greets us floor and balcony people, telling us that he wrote the song some two decades ago whilst watching children play and despairing of the way in which adults fuck up the world, saying it is a song that tragically follows him around, remaining unfortunately always relevant.
Warren Ellis looks content in his burrow of fiddle, handheld keyboard, guitar and little canteen-style seat, which he leaps onto now, scraping the fiddle, which he grips with black painted nails, shredding it like an electric guitar, his shoes polished to within an inch of their life. At song’s end he blows giant kisses to the audience. On ‘Jubilee Street’ he grabbles with his guitar like it’s wriggling away and at some stage Mullins slams on the flux capacitor and we’re at warp speed, the crowd, all the way to the back, in rapture.
‘From Her to Eternity’, the oldest of the Seeds’ tracks on display, unleashes the devilish incarnation of the outfit, Cave and Ellis, writhing and whipping imaginary horses, peering into the audience wailing “Hey Sister! Hey Brother!”, both now lathered in sweat. Before ‘Long Dark Night’, a wonderful ballad with which to catch breath with, Nick lists adjectives that best describe Warren, finishing with the most fitting – genius.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds at 3Arena. Copyright Jason Doherty.
We go even deeper on ‘Cinnamon Horses’, Nick’s vampiric eyes glistening at the latent surrender in it, the innocence of it, crushed. The apocalyptic Elvis of ‘Tupelo’ has thousands of hands in the air, clapping, Ellis playing the fiddle pizzicato style, Cave grasping hands in the audience, the squall of it is tremendous, rolling and ebbing across us.
By ‘Conversion’, we’re at fever pitch, Nick beseeching “Stop! You’re beautiful!”. It’s Van, James Brown and Bowie, alloyed as one. Fitting in with the religious overtones, a man hands Cave his shirt with which to wipe his brow, handing it back he quips with fine Aussie wit, “I don’t know if that’s you or me, mate, that’s rank.”
The in-house camera shoots ‘Bright Horses’ from behind of stage, the black and white image of Nick standing on a sea of heads, all raising their hands in supplication is timeless and beautiful. The plaintive wail of Warren on ‘Joy’ rises us even more, and when the music drops out and it’s just Nick singing, “I jumped up like a rabbit and fell down to my knees/Called out all around me, said, ‘Have mercy on me, please/Have mercy on me, please’”. Oh man you know this is the good medicine, this is the healing.
The meditation of ‘I Need You’ is beyond powerful, a close-up of Nick’s face is almost too intrusive, you feel you should look away, but greedily, you don’t. The pain is too much, it takes too much to compose at this standard of elevation, repeatedly, plaintively begging “I need you, I need you, I need you, just breathe, just breathe, I need you…”
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds at 3Arena. Copyright Jason Doherty.
Nick chops Sinead O’Connor into the lyrics of ‘Carnage’ which is a noble tribute and into the sway of ‘Final Rescue Attempt’ we sail. There’s steam coming off Warren’s fiddle and the screech of the damn thing is marvellous.
During the delivery of ‘Red Right Hand’, Nick encounters a bare-backed man with large tattoos of Cave and Ellis stamped on his chest. “That’s a commitment”, he compliments, then grips him, cradles him, sings to him; while Big Jim Sclavunos chimes the bells and keyboardist Carly Paradis conjures Peaky Blinders, before Cave conducts us in song, the audience scatting the melody. It’s mighty stuff entirely.
Into the Old Testament we reap on ‘The Mercy Seat’. The man sitting to my left, Johnny Cronin, has been including it in his set for years. “And the mercy seat is waiting/And I think my head is burning/And in a way I’m yearning/To be done with all this measuring of proof/An eye for an eye/And a tooth for a tooth/And anyway I told the truth/And I’m not afraid to die.”
We reach crescendo on ‘White Elephant’, Nick even taking off his tie, loosening a few buttons, “I’m trying to relax”, he deadpans. The Gospel quartet, marvellous throughout, join him on the ramp and thus dramatically ends the set.
While we wait for the encore, nobody moves a muscle, on they return with ‘O Wow O Wow (How Wonderful She Is)’, the exquisite tribute to Anita Lane, “she lit the way for us”, Nick relates regarding her enduring influence on all things Seeds.
‘Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry’ comes complete with a Doors-style wig out and ‘The Weeping Song’ with rather wonderful mass flamenco clapping by the, it must be said, super-talented audience. The end comes with Nick Cave alone at the grand piano, lullabying us home with the eternal ‘Into My Arms’, a fine song to be taking the road with. Gig of the year.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds play the second gig of their two-night run at the 3Arena, Dublin, tonight, November 13.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds at 3Arena. Copyright Jason Doherty.
