"We go down to the river where the willows weep, take a naked root for a lovers seat. "
After demonstrating their cabaret-blues acumen on the excellent covers album Kicking Against the Pricks, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds delivered their first masterpiece, Your Funeral...My Trial, a sultry, heroin-soaked nightmare of an album that clearly indicated Cave's growing talents as a songwriter. Everything that Cave would go on to explore on future albums is here in fine originary form, including murder ballads, weeping bloody-mouthed love songs, carnivalesque phantasms, and brooding spaghetti-western goth burners. The album's obvious centerpiece is "The Carny" (also featured in Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire), with its swirling xylophones, bludgeoning pianos and Cave channeling both his inner backwoods preacher and arch storyteller. Some of the most stunning moments on Your Funeral...My Trial are the slower numbers, such as the exceedingly dark love song "Sad Waters" and the title track, with its stop/start rhythm and deliciously forsaken vocals. While its successor, Tender Prey, is often cited as the best Bad Seeds album of the eighties, Your Funeral...My Trial represents a gigantic leap forward artistically for the band and is perhaps Cave's most cohesive album.
Your Funeral My Trial (2009 Remaster)
1. Sad Waters (5:00)
2. The Carny (8:01)
3. Your Funeral, My Trial (3:56)
4. Stranger Than Kindness (4:47)
5. Jack's Shadow (5:41)
6. Hard On for Love (5:19)
7. She Fell Away (4:30)
8. Long Time Man (5:35)
I always thought this one was pretty distinctive but I'm going to have to jump on the bandwagon and say Tender Prey is my favorite followed very closely by Henry's Dream. Loom of the Land, what a song. I could just never get into this one. Maybe it was having to constantly flip over the double 45s which I felt was unnecessary. At least the US Homestead version was virtually identical to the UK Mute version if you care about such things.
ReplyDeleteSo there Voixautre, I thought you were British. I have no idea why.
Ol' Foggy, I'm quite fond of "Tender Prey" as well. I guess I like "Funeral" because, as you said, it's quite distinctive. I've got a great Rowland Howard post in the works, so stay tuned. No, not British. A Californian of all things ;)
ReplyDeleteA Californian, no kidding? I guess that explains the Paisley Underground thing. Under duress I might confess that I too am from California. Sadly, I can't stand the SoCal materialism that seems to be creeping it's way up the State. I moved to Humboldt county a few months ago to attend HSU. On some days (like today, for example) your blog is pretty much the highlight of my day. On other days Camper Van Beethoven plays at the bar down the street.
ReplyDeleteKeep up the good work. Without this blog and its scruffy little brother on some days I'd have nothing to look forward to.
Is PPP still scruffy's little brother?
ReplyDeleteSo I'm happy to sit here and listen to Talk Talk Live in the cans and I see Nick Cave posted. I don't want to read the review. I try but I can't stop myself. I read "heroin soaked" and it's all over, I'm downloading yet another Nick Cave cd. lol
I'm really enjoying the comments. Thanks to all for adding to this site.
O'Foggy, I'm no fan of SoCal either. I miss the bay area (did my grad work at UCB), but it'll have to do for now. In my occasional reveries, I imagine moving to Portland.
ReplyDeletescurfie, PPP will always be a scruffy little brother because Luna is my pride and joy. By the way, I'm posting occasionally now on Holyfuckingshit40000. You should check those posts out every so often. Stuff you wouldn't find here or at PPP
ReplyDeleteLOL I can't keep up with you!!
ReplyDeleteNice to see this classic show up here.
ReplyDeleteAnd SoCal's a big place. Let's not try to characterize it in one narrow shot, no? And being a NoCal ex-pat in the Southland, there is much I've come to appreciate. Just might have to work a little harder to find it.
Love how the internetz can seem like everywhere and nowhere all at once!
reindeer man, I'm native SoCal, born in Pasadena, and I agree, this geographical region has its advantages, but given the choice, I wouldn't look back :)
ReplyDeleteI was born in Newport Beach but raised in Coastal CenCal (Los Osos/Morro Bay). I lived in San Diego for a couple of years in the mid 90s and then, during a stint with the Marine Corps, was stationed in SD in 2002. I used to joke that there was always something going on in SoCal but I never could figure out where. Anyway, we're officially off topic. Reindeer Man, sorry if you felt I was generalizing. Every place I've ever been had it's advantages and disadvantages. LA has some of the best espresso I've ever had. Iraq was kinda nice from a certain perspective...
ReplyDeleteOl' Foggy, hmmm, now that I think about it, you're right. There are advantages anywhere if you look hard enough. For example, I lived for a year in College Station, TX, which is easily the last place I'd want to live again. However, there was this little old park with a stream running through and crayfish in the stream. I miss that park.....
ReplyDeleteThank you for a ll the fabulous posts!
ReplyDeleteAnon. you're welcome!
ReplyDeleteEven the worst Cave album is better than most other bands best, so an argument over whether this or Tender Prey is a better album seems almost irrelevant.
ReplyDeleteAnd I think everyone has contemplated moving to Portland at one time or another. I know I think about it with regularity, but I live in Oklahoma, so that's probably a factor. hah.
No Scum? Seems odd to omit that from the track-list since it has been on nearly every other incarnation of this album.
ReplyDeleteOklahoma, hmmm, yes, well, I spent two years in College Station, TX, so I ca relate
ReplyDeleteno "Scum" on the remaster :(
ReplyDeleteI want that fucking record! i like nick cave, his religous and darkest songs!! Greetings from Rio Grande, Tierra Del Fuego, Argentina.
ReplyDeleteIt's awesome to visit this web site and reading the views of all friends concerning this article, while I am also eager of getting experience.
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