Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - The Abattoir Blues Tour

The best deal since 2005’s 3-disc release of B-sides and Rarities, this 2 CD/2 DVD set of material from 2004’s European tour (one of the DVDs is actually the 2003 Hammersmith Apollo concert) finds Nick Cave possessed once again by the haunted fury of the pre-Good Son era. 2003’s Nocturama was the dullest release of Cave’s career, and the concert representing it here is a telling contrast to the November 11th, 2004 concert at London’s Brixton Academy on the accompanying DVD. Part of the reason for the fall and resurrection lies in Cave’s return to collaborating with a band rather than using them to orchestrate what were essentially solo projects. His failure in 2003 to retool the band into a collaborative unit finally led to the departure of Blixa Bargeld, which brought Cave out of his solo trance and back into the slashing vitality of his early Bad Seed days. This resulted in the dual release in 2004 of Abattoir Blues and The Lyre of Orpheus, both of which contained Cave’s most exciting work, both lyrically and musically, since 1992’s Tender Prey. As we can now hear, since he did not tour the States at this point, the live shows were even better than the albums. The two CDs offer highlights from the European tour, including versions of classics such as “Red Right Hand” and “Stagger Lee” that are even more terrifying than the originals, and a dedication of “The Weeping Song” to Bargeld that cannot work without the former band mate’s vocal, but is affecting nonetheless. [www.nickcaveandthebadseeds.com]