Nick Cave has given an replace on a brand new album with the Bad Seeds. In his newest Red Hand Files e-newsletter, Cave writes: “My plan for this year is to make a new record with the Bad Seeds. This is both good news and bad news. Good news because who doesn’t want a new Bad Seeds record? Bad news because I’ve got to write the bloody thing.” The final Bad Seeds album, Ghosteen, got here out in October 2019.
In the remainder of his Red Hand Files word, Cave continues, outlining how he’s already “written a few things, but they aren’t very good, or maybe they are, it’s difficult to tell.”
I began the method at 9am on January 1st. It is now January sixth – almost every week has handed and I’ve written just a few issues however they aren’t superb, or possibly they’re, it’s troublesome to inform. A form of doldrums has set in, perennial and predictable. It’s the identical with each report, I really feel that acquainted feeling of lack, like I’m a giant, dumb clean factor in a swimsuit. I’m grumpy as fuck and Susie has decamped for every week. Anything that resembles a artistic impulse is burrowed approach down in some mossy, froggy gap, asleep, I hope, not lifeless. I’ve to name it forth, provoke it from its slumber. It turns into a nasty, punishing, baggy-eyed enterprise. I’m beginning to get an infuriating sing-song voice in my head that really rhymes, like a insanity. Like unhappiness.
The first strains I wrote on January 1st have been –
Ushering within the 12 months he knelt down
And crushed his brother’s head with a boneThat felt like an okay technique to begin a report nevertheless it additionally felt form of terminal and didn’t actually go anyplace. Then just a few days later I added to it –
Ushering within the new 12 months he knelt down
And crushed his brother’s head with a bone
It’s my nice privilege to stroll you residence
In the rain. Hop inside my coat.That felt a bit higher, like one thing I assume, however not a lot. Then the following day, as a result of I had a rain theme going, I wrote –
The frogs within the gutter are leaping for God
Amazed of affection, amazed of ache
Amazed to land again within the gutter once moreAnd that felt prefer it summed issues up. Writing lyrics is the pits. It’s like leaping for frogs, Fred. It’s the shits. It’s the bogs. It really hurts. It is available in spurts, however few and much between. There is one thing obscene about the entire affair. Like crimes that rhyme. I hope this doesn’t final lengthy. I’m really scared. But it at all times does. Last lengthy. To write a music. You hope to God there’s something left. You are bereft. I’m going to cease this letter. It isn’t making issues higher. It’s like flogging a lifeless horse. Worse. It’s a hearse. A hearse of lifeless verse. Dead, Fred. Dead.
Love, Nick
Happy New Year everyone!