Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds Dig, Lazarus, Dig!! by: Ed Butler Tue:01-Apr-08 Label: Mute Year: 2008 WB rating 90 out of 100

"Prolix! Prolix! Nothing a pair of scissors can't fix!" bellows Nick Cave midway into 'We Call Upon the Author’. The centrepiece of Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! it’s a delicious burst of ironic exclamation, one that continues throughout the record. For Cave has certainly fallen for the exclamation mark, in all its brutal simplicity, his constant, exuberant exultations validating his re-acquaintance with storytelling and empowering the delivery of his famously twisted words.

For the tendency towards prolixity is one of the aspersions cast upon Cave by his detractors over the years, and it appears that the mustachioed wordsmith has responded by becoming even more verbose. On much of the record Cave’s familiar baritone croon is abandoned for a spoken word, almost conversational, oratory, transforming his tales of the usual misfits, murderers, sexual perverts and the titular Lazarus, nicknamed ‘Larry’, from traditional songs to meandering stories, with flesh-and-blood characters, lending an immediacy and intimacy which has sometimes absented itself from Cave’s more fanciful endeavours.

And Cave has rarely relished toying with the delivery of his lyrics so much. The smile twisting his features is audible when he wraps his lips around “He had a psychotic episode on a dude ranch/That involved a bottle of ammonia” on ‘Albert Goes West’, and “She rubs the lamp between her thighs/And hopes the genie comes out singing” on the smooth, murderously romantic ‘Hold On to Yourself’. Of course there are many more wondrous bon mots, but to tally them all would transform a simple review to a thesis, suffice to say those who share a predilection towards Cave’s idiosyncratic poetry will find themselves enmeshed in a suitably wordy web.

Cave’s recent excursion with half of the Seeds, Grinderman, has borne considerable fruit on Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, never more than on the title track, a funky, scratchy (and furiously funny) workout that would not be out of place Off Broadway. While Cave is not credited with any guitar work in the liner notes, he is photographed toting a six string quite rambunctiously, and the thrashy, quasi-amateur guitar work is occasionally reminiscent of the Grinderman foray, which, combined with the band’s penchant for silky, skilled musicianship, adds a delightful flavor of chaos to the record as a whole

And speaking of The Bad Seeds, once again they prove themselves the preeminent maestros of the Australian (or the world?) music scene – reminding one and all of their glaring omission from the ARIA hall of fame last year, an oversight artfully pointed out by Cave during his acceptance speech. As always, they’re the snappily dressed assassins, Marty Casey’s subtle, undulating bass on ‘Moonland’ and ‘Hold On to Yourself’ and Warren Ellis’ scratchy violin on the latter song highlights.

The album also seems to draw on Cave’s previous opus, the Abattoir Blues/Lyre of Orpheus double-disc, in that it is undoubtedly a record of two halves. The first five tracks are Grinderman cool, laced with the usual bawdy licentiousness, fuzzy Hammond organ and the Bad Seeds chanting backing vocals. But after ‘We Call Upon the Author’ and it’s faux hip-hop breakdowns a gear shift takes place and we bear witness to down-tempo, gently crooning, No More Shall We Part-era Cave.

In fact, Cave seems to have swallowed his entire career whole, and, in regurgitating it, repackaged as Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, he and his smartly attired cohorts have created something truly wonderful. Lazarus, while not the epic masterpiece that Abattoir Blues/Lyre of Orpheus was, is by turns fiery, literate, exciting, uplifting and gentle.

And of course, Mr Cave himself. Capable of seamlessly shifting from firebrand, libidinous, pervert/preacher to gentle lovestruck crooner to smart arsed, beer-swilling middle-aged lothario, he has, once again moved away from his previous releases, reinventing himself while remaining true to his past.

On Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have added another exclamation point to an already bulging resume, and proved, again, that when it comes to intelligent, melodic rock and roll, as well as dirty Australian funk, they are untouchable.