Matilda Munro
, May 3rd, 2021 11:54
Matilda Munro reviews Mark Mordue s new book on the early life of a Bad Seed
Photo by Bleddyn Butcher
To write about Australianness is a contradiction in terms, as one of the country’s effects is to rob you of all will to put it into words. It tends to be only those who leave that get anywhere near laying out the truth of the place. It’s the case for many of its major wordsmiths over the past decades: Patrick White, Peter Carey, Clive James, David Malouf, Tim Winton, Robert Hughes, as well as for painters Brett Whiteley and Sidney Nolan. The bass notes of the place rumble out and away from the coastal cities, beneath the unforgiving sky, and through an eternal California of the intellect, where addiction is endemic, threat of violence constant, and the blood of all the convicts and all the natives lies in the dust. There is all the quiet horror of the Church, and the contradiction – through the sheer distance itself – that Australia enf
Mon 15 Mar 2021 03.00 EDT
At 63, the singer-songwriter Nick Cave cuts an urbane, almost sanctified figure. Currently based in Brighton, this erudite career artistâs recurring preoccupation, since the 2015 death of Arthur, one of his teenage sons, has been transmuting profound grief into beauty.
For many decades, though, Cave fronted a series of bands whose confrontational performances dealt in threat, derangement and deeply corporeal concerns. In his 20s, he was a goth poster boy, a heroin addict whose musings on toxic masculinity and God, outlaws and perdition fuelled a succession of swaggering bands and a lasting myth.
This engrossing book ends where Caveâs fame â or infamy â really begins: when an Australian band called the Boys Next Door stepped on to a plane bound for London in 1980. By the time they landed, theyâd changed their name to the Birthday Party, and would go on to make a lasting, sulphuric mark on the post-punk music scene internationally.
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The singer’s choirmaster took great pride in inspiring him, but a certain other PJ was the real influence
Daft Punk have announced they are splitting up. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian
Daft Punk have announced they are splitting up. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian
Sun 28 Feb 2021 02.30 EST
Nick Cave has been squatting rent-free in my mind all week. On Thursday, he and collaborator Warren Ellis released an album –
Carnage – every bit as consuming as its predecessor, 2019’s
Ghosteen. By day, I heard Cave swinging from swagger to sorrow. By night, I juggled a massive hardback: