Photo Courtesy KLRU & Scott Newton
If you’ve read any reviews of Nick Cave’s performance at a taping for the 40th season of PBS series Austin City Limits this past weekend, you’ll know critics are describing Cave as the Devil incarnate; I wish I could disagree but it’s the goddamned truth. Dressed in black, tan chest glistening under gold chains, Cave delivered a performance without reservations Sunday evening. He jumped, thrusted, swayed, cursed, blasphemed, and crooned the packed Moody Theater for an hour’s worth of crushingly loud deliverances and sexualized come-ons.
Platform extensions on both sides of the stage allowed Cave to extend himself to the audience where throngs of writhing hands lifted upwards for a quick grasp of his robes. He gave much more than that. Hands supported his slender figure as he leaned into his lustful disciples. “I saw you last night,” Cave said to a blond in the front row, referring to his Saturday night performance. “At the show, of course,” he clarified with a smirk.
Photo Courtesy KLRU & Scott Newton
This introduction was all we needed as the band proceeded to up the volume ante to levels I haven’t heard in the Moody Theater. “Jubilee Street,” the second track off the Bad Seeds’ 15th and most recent studio album Push the Sky Away let the floodgates open with a surge of power and energy with Cave as the epicenter of the blast. Drummer Jim Sclavunos provided incredibly thundering drums (with a little help from a drum triggered sample of actual thunder) with a snare like lightning. Warren Ellis commanded his sector of the stage with theatrical violin playing, calling upon higher powers to harness the energy that wanted to fly from his bow. Longtime Bad Seeds pianist, Conway Savage, sat cool and unfazed by the chaos that swirled around him, looking like a deranged Einstein with wisps of gray hair standing at end from the electricity in the air.
The climax of the set came with the Bad Seeds’ rendition of “Stagger Lee.” With too many expletives to list, Cave sings from Stagger Lee’s point of view, who, naturally, is the baddest motherfucker around and will even quiet the Devil himself for challenging the title. Is Cave singing about Stagger Lee, an American folk legend whose claim to fame is murder, or is Cave singing about himself? Like Tom Waits, time and apparent auras seem to make these lines less clear, and the character Nick Cave appears as onstage begins to take a more tangible existence.
Photo Courtesy KLRU & Scott Newton
Nick Cave. A presence. A spirit. A demon. An apparition that came into my life Sunday night, picked me up, entered my consciousness and dropped me back in my seat without saying “Goodbye.” Like a strumpet I was had. Cave oozed sex at every twitch of his mouth. The sides curling up as he strutted into the crowd, pointing individuals out, marking them. He grins because he knows what he does and knows it will work. He calls us “Motherfuckers” and we cheer. We want the abuse. We want the excuse to be bad. We want to blame Nick Cave. And Nick Cave will gladly accept. He’s an old soul—you can hear it in his yelping, howling delivery. Like a dog he goads us into following him deeper into sin. One gets the feeling he has treated many audiences to the same special attention, but we allow him to hold our hands. He takes the blame because he can’t be saved. His transgressions are beyond penance, but that’s why we want him. For a night, we escaped and were taken by the Dark Side. Now, I’m not sure I want to come back.
Setlist:
1) “We Real Cool”
2) “Jubilee Street”
3) “Tupelo”
4) “Red Right Hand”
5) “Mermaids”
6) “From Her to Eternity”
7) “Love Letter”
8) “God is in the House”
9) “Higgs Boson Blues”
10) “The Mercy Seat”
11) “Stagger Lee”
12) “Push the Sky Away”
