Does an artist need to believe—or at the very least consider—the existence of God (or the divine, a higher power, or whatever it is you want to call it) in order to create transcendent work? That’s the question I’ve been wrestling with ever since listening to an advanced copy of the audiobook for Nick Cave … Continue reading
In his Last Will and Testament made in 1987, on view in the sprawling exhibition Stranger Than Kindness: The Nick Cave Exhibition, Nick Cave requested: “…money earned on records, both publishing and record sales, should be used to have and maintain a small but adequate room or rooms that will serve as the “Nick Cave … Continue reading
In the nebulous period of 1983 and 1984 between the drug-fueled dissolution of the trash can-driving, six-inch-gold-blade-slicing, zoo-music-girl-lusting, junkyard royalty The Birthday Party and the official designation of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Nick Cave played a smattering of clubs under a few different titles. There was Nick Cave and the Cavemen, which is … Continue reading
It probably says something that Nick Cave mused about becoming a cult leader two nights in a row at New York’s Beacon Theatre. This tip of the hand happened at the start of “Balcony Man,” the final comedown song on the hallucinatory album Carnage, released last year with his musical partner-in-crime Warren Ellis, that also … Continue reading
*Blows horn* *shoots confetti cannon* Happy New Year, dearest Filthy Dreams readers! Has it been a year or five? We can’t figure it out either. Can you believe the one year anniversary of the Capitol insurrection is only a few days away? Screw New Year’s Eve, what are you planning for that day? Storming a … Continue reading
You may not know this, dearest Filthy Dreams fanatics, but I’ve occasionally been accused of being long-winded. Rambling. Exhausting. Draining. Just a tad wordy. In a culture where we have writers and editors tweet-advising us to make articles shorter and more palatable for readers, I tend to do the opposite. I don’t care who likes … Continue reading
*scrolls intently on phone* Oh! Why hello there, dearest Filthy Dreams readers! Why you startled me! What’s that? What are my plans this Memorial Day? Why, voyeuristically peeking at other people’s drama, of course! Sure, sure. I know some of you ambitious readers may want to go camping or for a day at the beach … Continue reading
I wanna tell you about a girl… Ok, I had to. How else to start a tribute to Anita Lane, the enigmatic singer and songwriter with the otherworldly energy of a haunted Victorian doll and a quaalude-soaked childlike voice to match, other than a reference to the opening line of the song “From Her To … Continue reading
Nick Cave’s epic poem The Sick Bag Song opens with a leap into the abyss. “A boy climbs a riverbank. He steps onto a railway bridge. He is twelve years old,” it begins. Walking on this bridge, the boy stands at the middle, gazing down at the river below with a “half-felled tree” that … Continue reading
*blows party horn* *shoots confetti cannon* Ahhh…Happy New Year, dearest Filthy Dreams readers! Get ready for that champagne hangover after battling the hoards of amateur drinkers on these final days of 2019! …or 2020. What year is it? Did we have a year? Or is this still some cold sweat alcohol-poisoning fever dream after choking … Continue reading