Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - June 2001 concert review

Just because I will never ever feel jaded when it comes to music, as long as bands and musicians like this still exist... I wrote this the day after I saw Nick Cave at the Transbordeur in Lyon in 2001, and 11 years on it's still one of the best shows I have ever been to. So here is what I wrote in my diary back in 2001, the day after the show:

Saturday 9th June 2001 - Grenoble, France
I saw the best concert I'd ever been to last night: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Strangely enough I didn't feel as hysterically excited as I did before the Cure concert last year, it was all more calm. Maud and I were the first people to arrive at the Transbordeur (in Lyon), and as we were sitting in the carpark, smoking cigarettes and reading I saw Nick Cave go by... He is as absolutely gorgeous in the flesh as he is in pictures and on the screen. The man is everything: character, humour, uncharacteristic gorgeousness - anyway, he really is just this whole image. First it started with his music (this mini obsession I have with him) - when I was younger Louise used to listen to him all the time and I used to pretend to hate it, and then suddenly I fell in love, and now I can't go a day without listening to him. Anyway, it's a whole: the music, the person, the lyrics... Anyway, where was I?
The doors to the hall were opened around 7pm, and Maud and myself didn't even think of grabbing first row places, we ended up going up the steps, middle back, where we had a great view and we could sit down, and we weren't far from the front at all. The support band was not that good, well I didn't like it anyway. Australian band lacking in many things, especially atmosphere.

And then Nick Cave. It's undescribable really. The band started off with Do You Love Me? (great way to start!), and continued on, with many songs from the last album (at the time was No More Shall We Part), beautiful songs, especially the one I had difficulty containing my tears to, Hallelujah, others like Red Right Hand, The Mercy Seat, Henry, Into My Arms and many more. Nick Cave was wonderful, he's still full of energy, of anger, of pain... So were the Bad Seeds, although I found Blixa to have a little less energy than the rest, maybe he's always like that. Anyway, the audience was great, except for the idiot stagediver, you couldn't hear anyone during the slower songs, total respect, followed by thundering applause and cries.
When they left the stage the first time the whole audience was so heated up, front to back, that everyone felt as one big clap and stamp of the foot. They came back twice, two encores.

Excellent, fabulous, enchanting, too short, but it would never have been long enough. I want to see it again and again and again and again... I feel some kind of sense of fulfillment though, I saw Nick Cave and it was brilliant, even better than I could have expected, and I will see him again in a few years. That voice... So powerful and beautiful. To be honest, they are even better live than on album, and that is extremely difficult. They are all so together on stage. I can't explain all the emotions I felt during the concert, but it's all there and here, in my head and in my heart.

After the concert was the slight problem of getting home. Now Maud and I usually have a total lack of organisation going on, it's like we will organise the logistics of doing something and getting there, and the rest will work itself out. I love it. So we really didn't know how to get back to Grenoble (note: Grenoble is about 100km through the mountains from Lyon). We had the train timetable and saw that the last thing back to Grenoble was a bus from the Part Dieu station. We had 20 minutes to get there. We tried to hitch a ride and thankfully a nice couple dropped us off right in front of the station. We ran around looking for the buses, found where they were and looked for ours. Not there. Ten minutes later I looked at the timetable again and realised that it was only valid from June 10th onwards. That bus didn't even exist yet!!! Thankfully there was a train to Grenoble at twenty past midnight so we drank cappuccinos waiting for it and sang Henry Lee and Do You Love Me? on the train. I tell you we were lucky because otherwise we would have been hanging around in Lyon until 6am!!! Not that we really cared we were on such an emotional high.
Anyway, I have my literature exam on Monday, my last exam this year, so I had better go and finish reading Macbeth again. I hope the exam will be with Mme Blattes and that it will be on The French Lieutenant's Woman... I can't wait for it to be over at last.

Thank God for the pure existence of Nick Cave.


Note: The official live DVD released for this tour was actually the footage of this show in Lyon. Another note: I have seen Nick Cave many a time since then and he is always amazing.

Thought Forms In New York

Thought Forms In New York, a set on Flickr.

Full story to come in the next few days, but here is a collection of photos taken over the past 10 days. Wonderful friends, great music and an all-round amazing time!

If anyone wants a copy of the pictures let me know.

The Ettes (and who the fuck is Imelda May anyway?!)

I have heard of The Ettes before. I own a couple of their albums and enjoy listening to them. I have however never heard of Imelda May. Or I hadn't until last night anyway...
It was my fourth and last shift of the week at the bar, and I was feeling a little tired and fragile, just chatting away to my friend in an otherwise empty bar, when in walked three lovely people who proceeded to tell me the story of their night. They happened to be The Ettes, and instead of performing in Boston as they were supposed to that night, were having a drink at 200 Orchard. I mean, I love my work, and love working in one of my favourite bars in NYC, but I don't think I would have chosen drinking there instead of playing a gig...
So after serving them few drinks and introducing ourselves, it appears that The Ettes had been asked to support Imelda May on her US tour. Just fresh off another tour, they packed up there gear, rented a van and set out on the road again. Along the way from Nashville to Boston, a small interview was posted HERE. A little tongue in cheek, a little playful, but nothing harmful at all... But apparently Imelda May didn't appreciate it and kicked them off the tour. Yes, kicked them off the tour while they were already in Connecticut, having driven all the way from Nashville that day for the first gig.

Coco (Lindsay) explained that the journalist had taken her out of context, and basically changed her words so they sounded like she was telling Imelda to watch her back, but even so, the article just sounds playful! Was it really worth actually kicking them off her tour? What was she worried about? That they would actually be better than her and literally blow her off the stage?! Who gets scared of a little fun competition? Don't you actually want to have a good support band to warm up the crowd before you go on? And also, does she Google herself everyday and scrutinize every article that says something about her? Because this tiny article would never have been noticed if she didn't! And how many people actually bought tickets for the shows because they wanted to see The Ettes? What are Imelda's team going to do about that?!

Sometimes I just wonder what happened to rock n roll. Who cares about image? It's all about the bloody music... Or apparently it isn't for some musicians...

To me it all sounds like a big pile of terrible PR BS on the part of Imelda May and her team. Having had the pleasure to actually meet the members of The Ettes, and talk to them for a few hours, I found that they are the most lovely, down to earth and interesting people, and obviously never wanted to hurt anyone's feelings. They just wanted to play their music for their fans.

I just had to write about this as it made me so angry last night. I hope The Ettes get back to Nashville safely, are able to get some of the money they spent on all of this back, and are able to forget all of this crap. They didn't deserve this to happen to them. Even the journalist who wrote the article is mortified as he never meant it to be taken that way... I guess some "stars" think way too highly of themselves.

I still don't know who Imelda May is and really don't have any need to find out.


I hope they make it back to NYC soon - they were an absolute pleasure to meet and talk to, and made me want to visit Nashville even more now!