2 keepers
keeper avg .250
Nick Cave's sixteenth album with The Bad Seeds starts with the menacingly thrumming "Jesus Alone"****, whose chanted, liturgical "with my voice I am calling you" chorus gives the song an especially somber tone. Speaking of church-y stuff, "Distant Sky" utilizes church organ, as well as the responsive verses sung by Else Torp. As with most of the album, there is no percussion and minimal instrumentation in these songs, doubling down on the atmospheric elements of the album's predecessor, "Push The Sky Away" (2013). On "Magneto" this approach is taken to its subtlest extent, structured by just a few tinkled chords on piano, while Cave quietly murmurs in his most Leonard Cohen impression. Cave is at his most expressive on the spooky "Anthrocene"****, set against splashes of quiet but urgent percussion and a soundscape of spectral whines. In "Rings of Saturn" Cave speaks over a Moby sound-alike backing track, complete with repetitive wo-oh's and old LP crackles, while the chanted verses of somber torch song "Girl in Amber" resolve into a spacious, major chorus resembling Radiohead, giving us a little aughts revival.
"I Need You" is the culmination of this dreary journey; Cave constantly intones over an unabating synth string section, nearly sniveling like a child who had all their screens taken away. The album then concludes with the title track, a stately ballad somewhere between U2 and Bruce Springsteen, which is as close to radio-friendly as this album gets. Nearly across the board, critics really really like this album, and the events surrounding this album's production may be a factor. When reviewed, there usually seems to be a suggestion that the album is associated with the death of Cave's son, though when that tragedy happened most of the album's tracking had already been completed. Though most of the album is compelling in a way, there's a lot of monotonous chanting, perpetually static instrumentation, and unrelenting bleakness which gets tedious. I'm glad to have this review done.
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