Breathe Lazarus’s Breath: Grinderman & Grinderman 2

By Matt White
Contributing Writer

Nicholas Edward Cave happens to be one of a handful of literary rock icons. In a career which spans more then three decades, he has been the front-man and songwriter for four seminal, groundbreaking bands. Long before “Goth” became synonymous with daft makeup and silly empty calorie posturing (The Cure, Marilyn Manson), Cave founded The Birthday Party and his confrontational and almost religious lyrics, along with Cave’s menacing stage presence, led him to be compared favorably with Iggy Pop.

The Birthday Party also led Mr. Cave to be dubbed, “The First Goth Rocker,” now Gothic in its true definition meaning; bizarre romantic, can certainly be used to some extent to describe what Mr. Cave and The Birthday Party were about. Nevertheless it’s a title Nick Cave has never been happy about.

In 1984 Nick Cave founded Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds which to date has released 16 studio albums; all of which not only prove that Mr. Cave is a brilliant lyricist, on par with his heroes Leonard Cohen, Johnny Cash and Lou Reed, but also serve as to cement that both he and the ever rotating line-up of Bad Seeds are one of the best and most admired (by any knowledgeable musician) bands of the past thirty years.

In particular, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds’ “The Boatman’s Call” record is a sad and resounding answer to the universal longing we all feel in regards to love and belonging. In fact, when I was visiting with an uncle of mine who teaches at the Conservatory Of Music in Vienna, he and I played around with Brompton Oratory from The Boatman’s Call.

About two years ago I was on the East Coast where my family and I asked my aunt, who happens to be a classical musician from France, what it was like to be on the same bill as Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. “I remember thinking his lyrics and delivery were very violent” was what she said.

One thing that critics, always mention when writing about Mr. Cave is his penchant for what are termed Murder Ballads. Songs in which the protagonist either kills or is killed. What critics (and I don’t consider myself to be one, because I actually record and perform music) always fail to do is connect the dots between Cave’s music and the blues, early country and 50s rockabilly, all of which share an abundance of murder ballads from the various songsters of those types of music.

That “violence” if you really want to call it that, is also present through out Mr. Cave’s two acclaimed novels, “And The Ass Saw The Angel,” and “The Death Of Bunny Munro” as well as his screenplay for the 2005 film “The Proposition.”

Confrontation, love, darkness, the understanding of longing and literary depth are Nick Cave’s most formidable talents.  That’s where his new project, a band called Grinderman comes in. Grinderman is an old blues term which is given to a male with a knack for sexual conquest/power.

As of December 2010, Grinderman has released two studio albums, Grinderman and Grinderman 2. The records themselves are stand-alone amazing. The first record is like a shot of pure adrenaline into the ever confused and dying heart of international music. Track one, titled “Get It On” is the perfect introduction into the strange and immediate world of Grinderman. You see, the best front-men have been the ones that can provoke any number of reactions from their audience on any given night.

On the other side of spectrum, the best songwriters have always been the ones that can convey image or idea through rhythm and verse, and do it in such a way as to not insult the listeners intellect or disparage the listeners own interpretation of the message. These are both things that Nick Cave can do so expertly that even a song called “No (‘bad’ word for a part of female anatomy) Blues” can take a simple and nasty notion of a song and turn it into a four minute, twenty second iconoclastic look at loneliness in its most naked form.

Where Grinderman’s first record is an untamed and unleashed band that urges the listener to submit to it’s own whims and darkly framed beauty, Grinderman Two is a more jealous sounding record. The record ignites like a house fire and doesn’t stop raging until track eight “Palaces Of Montesuma” but with lyrics like “The spinal cord of JFK Wrapped in Marilyn Monroe’s negligee” it still burns.

Both the albums are a nice literate breath of smoke- and sex-filled air, especially when you consider what’s been floating around on clear-channel radio over the past decade. I urge you to breath them in.

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