*Track 21
The Sorrowful Wife - 24th March 2019
“If women ran the world, we wouldn’t have wars,” the late, great Robin Williams once observed, “just intense negotiations every twenty-eight days.” A good joke, if more than a little ‘hormonally incorrect’ nowadays. In light of recent events however, Stuart reflected, it maybe held more than a grain of truth, in its set-up at least!
Yesterday a giant image of Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s Prime Minister, embracing a mourning Muslim woman had been projected onto the side of the world’s tallest building, Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, in recognition of the astounding grace and leadership she had shown responding to the recent terror atrocity in Christchurch.
Ardern’s swiftness in condemning the white supremacist, alt-right perpetrator as a terrorist, the humanity with which she reached out sympathetically to the wider Muslim community, and her breath-taking decisiveness in moving beyond words (by immediately reforming her country’s gun laws), had all been universally applauded; prompting an understandable, and for the moment seemingly unstoppable, campaign suggesting she should be considered for a Nobel Peace Prize.
That must be the same Burj Khalifa, Stuart couldn’t help mentally digressing, that Conor O’Brien incongruously references in ‘Passing a Message’, declaring himself, “blind to its beauty.” Given Conor always seemed one of Stuart’s more empathetically minded mavericks he would, presumably, have had less difficulty yesterday in recognising the building’s enhanced grace, and happily acknowledged that Jacinda had passed an incredibly powerful message of her own.
When it came to world leaders, it struck Stuart, a small cup of feminine sensitivity could likely achieve far more than a bucket-load of masculine machismo.
Ardern’s instinctive humility and understanding had turned the aftermath of a tragic event on its head, shining a beacon of light on a world where we could live together more harmoniously, exposing the words of those promoting conflict as beatable dogma.
A simple contention that we all hold a responsibility for our own actions, and small individual acts of kindness can collectively add up to something bigger (delivering a wider global good), hadn’t sounded either simplistic nor naïve coming from Jacinda. More inspirational. It was perhaps surprising then, in this light, that Stuart’s second musical jump from Ardern had landed on a member of his ‘maverick’ community frequently labelled, in lazy journalistic parlance, as, “the Prince of Darkness.”
Jacinda and Nick would surely get on admirably, Stuart surmised. She even (and he had to smile at this realisation) looks a bit like PJ Harvey! His linkage of the two had though been prompted more by a striking resemblance between their separately argued articulations advocating how tragic circumstances can, potentially, become unexpected progenitors for a more humane world.
It would have been wholly understandable if Nick Cave had responded to his son’s tragic accidental death by withdrawing from society, taking solace in private grief, and yet, while that may have happened in the immediate aftermath, he subsequently walked a much braver path; baring his soul to the wider world, engaging openly with his loyal fans through ‘The Red Hand Files’. Nick seemed to have found a new belief that loss, in its many forms, was a universal currency (never owned by the few). One from which we could all draw mutual, cathartic benefit if discussed unabashedly.
Stuart looked forward to reading each new ‘Red Hand File’ post. Some were short and humorous, others deeper and more intensely reflective, but all contained a profundity that made you stop and think about the world differently, to reflect anew on the human condition. Each entry came couched in beautifully crafted prose, prompting two simultaneous, conflicting reactions; on the one hand Stuart was always in awe over how far Cave’s literary talent extended (beyond his obvious lyrical dexterity), while on the other he experienced an unavoidable sense of jealousy.
For someone as obsessed with words as Stuart it sometimes felt as if Nick had made an unfair, monopolistic land grab of all the world’s best words and phrases.
It was ‘Red Hand Files #28’, first published a month back, that had made a re-entry into Stuart’s mind this morning, having recalled how similar a chord it struck to Ardern. Responding to a fan’s pointed enquiry over, “how do you deal with evil?” Nick, with his customary eloquence, had argued, “we cannot eradicate evil, yet it need not paralyse us, rather we should take what steps we can, however small, toward the betterment of the world, and our place in it. This is the essence of creativity.”
It didn’t seem likely Jacinda was going to need a scriptwriter anytime soon, she was doing just fine on her own, but if such a vacancy ever arose then Nick should surely be top of her shortlist. Acting in tandem this pair would be a shoe-in for that Peace Prize!
Stuart couldn’t deny his ‘maverick miscellany’ too often resembled a museum, with little in the way of contemporaneous exhibits, but his extensive ‘Cave collection’ at least provided one gallery where modern masterpieces could be displayed amongst old masters. Sixteen studio albums, stretching back thirty-five years, yet each new Bad Seeds release managed a degree of evolution and freshness most established acts had long ago given up on. It had been a frustrating three years since ‘Skeleton Tree’, but Stuart had no doubt, once a follow-up finally arrived, it would be worth the wait.
He had always enjoyed the geographically appropriate happenstance of having first ‘fallen’ for Nick Cave whilst driving over the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and could still recollect his astonishment at hearing the dextrous simplicity (and hidden depths) of ‘Into My Arms’ as the song aired exclusively on Triple J, a wonderful radio station (an antipodean prototype for 6 Music) that had become a work-trip addiction. The song proved a siren call for the exquisite ‘Boatman’s Call’ album, which in turn led to the discovery of a rich Bad Seeds back catalogue, one of the many shared passions he and Anne then bonded over after his return.
Charlie had reminded him often since, citing his gig list as evidence, that they had previously seen The Birthday Party, but in any hazy recollection Stuart had of this event (probably less hazy than Cave’s!) he thought he remembered finding them, “too shouty,” a disparaging epithet he still used today to dismiss some of the newer bands his friends championed, like Fontaines D.C., or Idles. Stuart’s taste demanded an odd mix, discordant noise delivered with a melodic twist, a rare but winning formula he felt Nick only delivered upon once the Bad Seeds flowered.
This was, admittedly, a deep Cave exploration, but one which served to explain how, to ‘soundtrack’ his Sunday morning journey down to meet Ed and Charlie (for their agreed pre-concert quizathon), Stuart came to be listening to the Bad Seeds’ ‘No More Shall We Part’, an album he had always rated the band’s transitory masterwork.
Much like the way he admired New Order’s ‘Movement’, for representing a perfect segue between Joy Division and their future selves, never wholly one thing or the other (and all the better for it), Stuart felt ‘No More Shall We Part’ marked a similar fulcrum; balancing early, anarchic storytelling Bad Seeds with their later counterpoint of more reflective, if equally cathartic, song writing. Stuart loved both varieties of Seeds, but regarded this record as the ultimate melting pot between the two.
A perfectly crafted album was Stuart’s pre-eminent artform; it was his symphony, his epic poem, his much-loved painting or sculpture, his classic film, and his masterfully written novel. All rolled into one. Such strength of reverence meant he never found a top five list enough to pay the category justice, he even struggled to stop at ten.
While he might incur excess baggage charges, there were at least twenty albums Stuart would insist on accompanying him to his desert island, and ‘No More Shall We Part’ featured high on the list, if never quite managing to plant its flag at the summit. Yesterday, as he re-crafted a new countdown, it had again stalled at number four.
Stuart had saved this revised ‘best albums’ list to his phone, annotated with brief critiques, hoping early success on their ‘Challenge’ review may allow time afterwards to run his selections past Ed and Charlie for their input. Knowing his journey would take a couple of hours, he had pre-calculated that two full ‘listens’ to the album could still allow him time, in parallel, to reassess his ‘Top 20’, to solidify his arguments against any challenge he might face later. Who said men couldn’t multitask?
Being blessed with a ‘phonographic memory’, Stuart wouldn’t need to risk life and limb on the M1 (by reading from his phone) to achieve the second of these tasks. His Schwarzenegger like ‘total recording-recall’ allowed him to retain, in detail, the four pages of annotation (in time honoured reverse order) he had added to Notes yesterday. Conscious of the tight schedule he had in front of him however, Stuart slotted the Bad Seeds CD into the car’s player the second he waved goodbye to Anne.
###
‘As I Sat Sadly by Her Side’ – A great album needs a great scene setter, and this opener was one of the most cinematic songs Stuart knew. Never explaining its protagonists’ relationship, or revealing the source of their philosophic conflict, it leaves the listener to fill the gaps. Particularly the payoff line, which (like Polly’s ‘You Said Something’) always left Stuart ruminating for ages; speculating why the song’s self-righteous, world weary narrator couldn’t wipe a smile from his face?
20) ‘Back to Black’ by Amy Winehouse – Writing such timeless songs should never seem this effortless. The title track remains extraordinary, and ‘Love is a Losing Game’ always brings a tear for Amy’s lost potential.
19) ‘The Smiths’ by The Smiths – Sadly sliding down Stuart’s list, as the freshness of Marr’s music, and the one-time wonder at Morrissey’s words, became undermined by the latter’s increasingly moronic mutterings.
18) ‘Crocodiles’ by Echo and the Bunnymen – While Mac and most fans might favour ‘Ocean Rain’, this album’s blend of fresh-faced pop with an added dash of youthful arrogance was surely the Bunnymen at their best.
17) ‘Beautiful Freak’ by Eels – It takes a fractured mind to write oddball pop like ‘Susan’s House’ and ‘Novocaine for the Soul’, and E had always possessed a monster (Shrek sized) one, with which he goes, “everywhere together.”
16) ‘Grand Prix’ by Teenage Fanclub – Unlikely as it might seem, three separate song writers (and singers) combine to create one perfect, flawless coherence that wholly contradicts ‘Don’t Look Back’s evocation of, “an empty feeling.”
- Ed might deride Teenage Fanclub as soft rock, but can ‘Neil Jung’s beauty really be denied?
- Charlie had never shared his love of Eels, but could surely be persuaded by ‘Rags to Rags’?
- Faced with friendly fire, over a lowly Smiths, he would argue how the words now rankled.
‘Hallelujah’ – Possibly the record’s centrepiece, yet Stuart found it a coin that could fall either way, with conflicting emotions. Landing cynically on ‘tails’, the song’s metaphors reveal an artist facing writer’s block, tackling addictions in a rehab clinic, but under a more innocent (less Cave-like) ‘heads’ it was possible to reinterpret the words as a less corrupt, modern fairy-tale, its nurse a protector from a big bad wolf.
15) ‘Horses’ by Patti Smith – An album of great songs (and even better poetry), but it was Patti’s provocative attitude throughout, more punk than a Rotten sneer, that ultimately made this such an unmatchable testament.
14) ‘Entertainment’ by Gang of Four – A heady cocktail of global, historical, and personal politics, mixed with Andy Gill’s angular guitar work (not bettered before or since) truly delivers, as the words suggest, “a contract in our mutual interest.”
13) ‘Turn on the Bright Lights’ by Interpol – Perhaps fairly accused of inhabiting a derivative twilight zone, somewhere between Joy Division and The Strokes, but to Stuart’s ears a more exquisite pastiche than ‘Obstacle 1’ had never been executed.
12) ‘Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea’ by PJ Harvey – A brief award-winning island of popularity, sitting adrift in Polly’s various oceans of wilful anti-commerciality, but one that exhibits the breadth of her talent at its broadest.
11) ‘77’ by Talking Heads – Once you have imagined a preppy student becoming a ‘psycho killer’, then the rest of the curious juxtapositions that underscore this album naturally follow, in a way that still startles today.
- Gang of Four and Talking Heads would probably both pass muster, with little controversy.
- ‘Horses’ may be a difficult sell, but he had a whole ‘changed’ music diatribe to back it up.
- PJ might prove a harder argument to win, but not one he was prepared to back down from.
‘God is in the House’ – Stuart didn’t hate this song, but had never loved it the way Nick seemed to. Thematically out of place, with its satirical take on fundamentalist religion sounding twee amongst the tortured angst that surrounds it. While he enjoyed the, “goose-stepping, twelve-stepping, Tetotalitarianists,” their jackboots always seemed to trample all over any chance the album had of securing top spot.
10) ‘Funeral’ by Arcade Fire – An album that seemed to come out of nowhere (OK Canada, which is almost the same!) with a fully realised, innovative sound, and a set of impassioned, pained lyrics that speak heartrendingly of loss.
9) ‘Dummy’ by Portishead – Unlike anything else, ever. This debut’s extraordinary production, enhancing Beth’s breath-taking vocals, delivers a Spector trumping ‘wall of sound’ that builds perfectly to a glorious zenith on ‘Glory Box’.
8) ‘The Scream’ by Siouxsie and the Banshees – The only fully coherent long player the initial punk explosion produced. Peel’s decision to play the whole album twice (in its disturbing entirety) on the day of release had been fully justified.
7) ‘I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning’ by Bright Eyes – Stuart found all Oberst, however obscure, worth observing! But it was little shock to him that the sheer quality of song writing on this album delivered Conor’s high water mark of popularity.
6) ‘Born Sandy Devotional’ by The Triffids – He had never found any other record more evocative, either musically or lyrically, of barren lands (and broken feelings). On any list of best-ever ‘Side Two’s, this would win hands down.
- It was unlikely any of these, save possibly ‘The Scream’, would make Ed or Charlie’s top ten.
- But they had long ago given up arguing with him over Bright Eyes, or indeed his pet Triffids.
- He’d refuse to spit out his ‘Dummy’ though, arguably the least derivative record ever made.
‘The Sorrowful Wife’ – In counter to ‘God is in the House’, Stuart’s favourite Cave song, but one its creator seemed to perennially undervalue. Rarely played live, yet the astounding (piano led) quiet start, slowly building to a raucous cacophony, seems uniquely fit for such a purpose. The song also has an added romantic twist, as Stuart often teasingly referred to Anne as his ‘sorrowful wife’, not that she was (he hoped!) but because she was undoubtedly, regularly, guilty of, “shifting the furniture around.”
5) ‘Is This It’ by The Strokes – The most ‘New York’ any band has ever managed to sound, a huge compliment given the depth and quality of the competition. Julian had never needed to fear that, “people, they don't understand.”
4) ‘No More Shall We Part’ by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The pivot point record between two strains of Bad Seed (pre and post ‘Into My Arms’), this album draws equally on those two transcendental states to create one perfect Cave nirvana.
3) ‘Even Serpents Shine’ by The Only Ones – An uninterrupted thematic, rhythmical flow, from start to finish, is a mark of any great album, and that’s delivered here as Perrett’s words and the band’s playing come together in one dazzling torrent.
2) ‘Unknown Pleasures’ by Joy Division – Stuns like a debut should. The band, aided by Hannett’s unconventional production, sound beguilingly other worldly; while those songs, and that voice, still retain their capacity to raise hairs.
1) ‘Faith’ by The Cure – Like Beethoven (with his ‘Eroica’) it had taken Robert Smith just three attempts to achieve perfection. Pop(ish) classics, intertwined with miserable melanges, all merge into one wonderful, seamless whole.
- Charlie’s no Cave-man, but Ed would support a Bad Seeds top slot (if possibly not this one).
- He expected little dispute on ‘Unknown Pleasures’, other than if it should be even higher, but
- Had ‘Faith’ his #1 would prompt a whole ‘brilliant songs’ versus ‘ balanced whole’ debate.
###
Having perfectly co-ordinated his album listening and list evaluation, Stuart pulled up outside Charl’s mansion (as he liked to refer to it!) just as ‘Darker with the Day’ was bringing ‘No More Shall We Part’ to its close for a second time.
It wasn’t really a mansion, not quite, but Stuart was unavoidably reminded (on each arrival) of the stark contrast between his friend’s home and the shared house, a stone’s throw away (with its miniscule garret rooms), they had rented on first moving to London. Stuart’s poky digs hadn’t even run to a single window back then, just a meagre skylight, yet Charlie now seemed to have dozens going spare!
The venue for their latest ‘Challenge’ review had been agreed in advance. The Haven Arms, a backstreet Victorian boozer, a short stroll from Charlie’s, had been the nearest they had come to a ‘local’ back in the day, and Stuart had suggested, “a sense of nostalgia,” might prove conducive (and appropriate) to their task at hand.
Ed, who had worked in the wilds of Scotland at the time, wouldn’t be able to join them down memory lane, but had conceded the location was, “alright by me, a pub’s a pub.”
###
(‘Track 21’ will be continued, at 9am tomorrow, with a big ‘reveal’!)