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Album Details

• Artist: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
• Album: Nocturama
• Label: Anti / Mute
• Year of Release: 2003
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2003-04-25

I always find it hard to review rock legend's new albums. Nick Cave is no exception. The reason that it is difficult is that you have an entire catalog to base an opinion on. Lately Nick and the Seeds have been putting out their best material ever with the amazing Boatman's Call just out in 1997. Now they have made the jump into the indie rock world and joined forces with Anti in the USA. 2001 marked the release of No More Shall We Part, which didn't quite have the immediacy that his previous albums had. In 2002 the group holed up for a week to record Nocturama. Talk about an immediate album. Nick took a bit of different approach to writing the material here. He took a musical idea down, created a set of lyrics, then moved onto the next track. He felt that this would allow his band to expand a little more and add their creativity to the tracks. It seems to have worked very nicely. The album opens with the gentle "Wonderful Life", which almost sounds like an Elvis Costello tune. Thinking that was a quiet track, we move into the piano ballad "He Wants You". This is one of my favorite tracks on Nocturama. They go right through until "Babe, I'm On Fire", where they hit their stride with a raucous roar of a song. Maybe a little Birthday Party influence here? Anyway, Nocturama marks a new beginning for the band in a strong way. This album is as good a place to start as any to find out what goes on in Nick Cave's brilliant mind. And for longtime fans they will find a renewed vigor in the band and the songwriting.

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