Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds LANDMARK: No More Shall We Part WB rating out of 100

Much can be said of the purpose or meaning of the term ‘landmark’. In the context of Nick Cave’s career, and the work he’s done with the Bad Seeds, every recorded release and live performance is a ‘landmark’ one of sorts. Anticipation, laudation: they’re two things Cave and his Seeds have taken in their stride.

No More Shall We Part was an album we all needed. With all signs pointing to disaster, it was a shot of pure beauty and elegance, a piece of genius that could only come from a deep well of suffering. In the four-year wait between The Boatman’s Call (another of Cave’s highly-acclaimed works) and the release of No More, fans were met with distressing tales of their idol’s drug and alcohol addiction, and were filled with dread at the prospect of his demise. Similarly, the release of 1998’s The Best of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds compilation would do nothing to allay any fears that The Boatman’s Call was the final chapter in the story of this brilliant collaboration of artists.

With this record, Cave produced one of the most strikingly cathartic musical experiences for anyone ever lost in despair. The Boatman’s Call hinted at what some called Cave’s ‘feminine’ side – the minimalist approach, the love balladry – and No More was a firm step in this direction. Whilst in certain circles this term may be seen as insult, feminine hits the mark perfectly: from the straight-out sex and violence-driven outward turmoil, Cave was now of an inner-focus. Rather than bleeding from gaping wounds, he’s shaking the bars of the prison such violence has landed him in; a turn from the physical to the emotional could be deemed a weakening, but only the man who has suffered physical pain could react with such emotional and spiritual yearning as Cave does on No More.

And it is the spirituality of Cave that makes itself known most on this record. From the explicit ‘Oh My Lord’, ‘Hallelujah’ and ‘God is in the House’, to the impliedly sacramental ‘And No More Shall We Part’, Cave is illustrating both his knowledge and his ignorance, his faith and lack thereof. It is not a dislike of religion, but a lament for what religion should stand for, listeners should not be mistaken.

When Cave sings “God is in the house/Oh I wish He would come out,” (‘God Is In The House’) he is not advocating atheism, but projecting the pain of the believer. Belief and faith is not being questioned, only the artificial garments the terms have been afforded by centuries of institutional regulation. The paradoxical relationship between love and marriage is one point of interest: the way a contract “drawn up” and a ring “locked upon the finger” (‘And No More Shall We Part’) can drain the love out of any situation. ‘Fifteen Feet of Pure White Snow’ has its religious allusions too: “Is there anyone else here who doesn’t know?” Cave asks, “We’re under fifteen feet of pure white snow?” Good intentions and meaningless uses of words like ‘love’, ‘hope’ and ‘generosity’, all serve to drown the humanity out of institutional spirituality. The ‘white snow’ of the church, and of wider society, consists of all these false promises, misunderstandings, lies and deceits, and everyone, religious or otherwise, is buried underneath.

But this spirituality, something so elusive for many of Cave’s spitefully atheistic listeners, while being the loudest and most resounding message No More has to offer, is no more effective than the quieter moments of self-loathing and all-too-human insecurity. ‘Love Letter’ may not be the most lauded of the album’s tracks, but it is of the same calibre of bleeding-heart emotiveness as his most commercially successful song ‘Into My Arms’. Cave repeats “said something I did not mean to say” with self-deprecating honesty that he is almost completely deconstructing the self-professed ‘loverman’ image of his youth. Warren Ellis’ gorgeous strings work beneath Cave uttering his “handful of hopeful words” makes for a stunningly simple, tear-laden piece; this could be analysed to death, from the McGarrigles’ backing vocals (perhaps alluding to the love letter’s recipient’s reciprocal feelings) to Thomas Wydler’s gentle brush-strokes, such is the perfection of the arrangement.

Similarly, as much as ‘Sorrowful Wife’ is an indictment on the institution of marriage, it is among the most evocative and moving pieces Cave has written. Juxtaposing his inner terror with his sorrowful wife’s meaningless activities, Cave depicts a man riddled with anxieties: as he fumes about the promises he never kept, she “is shifting the furniture around” or “quietly tending her flowers”. The anxieties are mixed in beautifully with nature imagery: “the water is high on the beckoning river” and “the grass here grows long and high”, with the whole world illustrating the tension, heightening the protagonist’s suffering. By the time the crescendo comes in the form of a brood, The Bad Seeds are again in top form, controlling the distorted chaos without taking the focus off Cave’s wonderfully edgy, wavering vocals.

It all comes back to the spirit, however, as even the ‘plea’, the ‘petition’ to a lost lover in ‘Love Letter’, is “a kind of prayer”. Full of parables, visions of human despair and suffering, all with a heavy emphasis on hope, No More itself has all the hallmarks of a religious text, and this is where the audience could be polarised.

So, how is this album a landmark in musical history? Not only were we being graced with another offering from the one and only Nick Cave, but we were being graced with a look into the soul of a man previously all about his ‘art’. For so many, ‘art’ can cloud reality, and in Cave’s case, it may have led to type-casting and caricaturing. No More gave us a vision of the artist, of the character he had created, in a completely different light: without the raucous play-acting he threatened to descend to at many times, Cave was bearing his soul and, with it, his insecurities. Perfectly paced, and as consistent a theme-album as the world has seen, there is barely a moment wasted, and barely a word uttered without conviction. The only unfortunate thing about this record is that it’s too draining for consecutive listens, so pure and unadulterated is the emotional input. After four years, however, with this sublime release, listeners echoed the sentiment: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, all we can wish is that no more shall we part.