Non - Narrative Illustration - Choice 2: Nick Cave - Murder Ballads

Nick Cave

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Murder Ballads

Background on the Artist

Nick Cave is a songwriter, musician, author, composer, screenwriter and a film actor from Australia. He was lead singer of a rock band called Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, formed in 1983 and they were known for their influences and musical styles. He was also the front-man of the band The Birthday Party and also formed the group Grinderman. His music is well known for it's intense emotion and obsessions with religion, death, love and violence. Nick Cave was also a drug user, when he left art school he started using heroin. 

Murder Ballads

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds album, Murder Ballads, released on February 5th, 1996 was an album entirely relating to murder/crimes of passion. Murder Ballads was the bands biggest success commercially.

Lyrics

After reading through the song lyrics from the album this is what I got from the analysis -

Song of Joy-

After listening to this song I realised that the story is pretty self explanatory. He was away visiting a friend and someone intruded in his and his wifes home and murdered her and their 3 children. This song is really emotional and I got a lot of imagery from it. Can't say the imagery was very nice but it was something nice to work from if I chose this album.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/songofjoy.html

Stagger Lee -

What I got from these lyrics was that a man named Stagger Lee was kicked out by his wife and went to a bar named The Bucket of Blood. He had a little argument with the bartender and Stagger Lee shot him in the head four times and then a woman comes in who flirts with Stagger Lee and she invites him back to her place and when he gets there a man called Billy Dilly comes in and then there is a mention of homosexual activity between Billy Dilly and Stagger Lee but Stag proceeds to shoot him in the head. I also think this song is very self explanatory and it is very visual which I think is really good. In conclusion, Stagger Lee got dumped so decided to go on a killing spree. 

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/staggerlee.html

Henry Lee-

In this song a man is seduced by a woman and he basically tells her that he has a woman waiting for him back home whom he loves more then her so she stabs him with a pen knife and he got thrown into a deep well. I didn't really get much imagery from this song. I think this has been a weak one with a weak story.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/henrylee.html

Lovely Creature-

This song is very cryptic in my opinion, what I get from this is that the man finds a woman and is in love with her but one day she just disappears and is apparently buried under the sands. I am finding it really hard to find information about the songs on this album so I am just going of my analysis alone and have no actual song facts. This song is also not so visual.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/lovelycreature.html

Where the Wild Roses Grow-

I really like the imagery I got from this song, I felt really empty and cold. I think this one about him meeting a woman and taking her to the place where the roses grow and he kills her because "all beauty must die". I am starting to think that this album would be really good to do art work for, the imagery and emotions are really strong.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/wherethewildrosesgrow.html

The Curse of Millhaven-

This song is based on the story The Jupiter Tree by Peter Straub which is a beautiful, tragic story which is portrayed in Nick Caves song. In the majority of his songs you can see the darkness that goes into them, along with rage which is caused by the emotional damage inflicted by molestation. I get a lot of imagery from this song, like a lot of Nicks music, there is a very strong story to work from there too.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/thecurseofmillhaven.html

http://www.bad-seed.org/caveinn/caveinn.shtml?/~cave/misc/straub.html

The Kindness of Strangers-

This song is also pretty self explanatory. A woman who grew up in a less fortunate family wanted to explore the sea and she went to do so and she met a strange man, who she did not invite back to her hotel room, he killed her. Cuffed to the bed, rag in her mouth and a bullet in her head. I really like the story behind this, it is so innocent but gets real and dark very quickly.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/thekindnessofstrangers.html

Crow Jane-

I didn't like this song because it is basically about a group of miners gang raping a woman ''and poured their pistols dry''. It's fair to say that there is a lot of strong imagery in this song but it's a little twisted for my liking. Judging from the end of the song where it says ''population now 28'' I think she may have gotten revenge and killed the 20 miners that attacked her.

http://rock.genius.com/Nick-cave-and-the-bad-seeds-crow-jane-lyrics#note-3189612

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/crowjane.html

O'Malley's Bar-

In this song a man walks into a bar (no joke intended;p), orders a drink, sits down and then pulls out a gun.Soon after the bar is a 'bloodbath' and he contemplates killing himself as the place is surrounded by police. Nick Cave said in an interview that he loves this character, he thinks he is trying to do everything which he thinks is right when in reality he is a ''fool with a gun''. I really like the story of this song, I think it is very visual and poetic and it really speaks to me. I understand it a lot and it's very moving.

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/omalleysbar.html

http://www.nick-cave.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=54&Itemid=29

Death is not the End-

This was originally written and performed by Bob Dylan. I feel that this song is more of a poem than a song and I really like it. I feel like it is about suicide, that someone is contemplating it but they are constantly being told that when you die it's still not over. Nick Cave once said that because this song has no death in it it's kind of a funny ending to the album. 

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nickcavethebadseeds/deathisnottheend.html

The art work for this album confuses me a little. It is a snowy night painting with a little cottage and I can see no connection between this and the songs on the album, unless I missed something...

After going through all of the lyrics to this album I have came to the conclusion that most of the songs have deep meanings and very strong visual spikes which I think is a really good thing because if I choose to go with this album then I will have a lot of imagery to work from. This album could be a very good choice and I will still consider choosing it.

(I apologise for the long text post, there will probably be a lot of these for the next few days as my plan for now is to research, research, research!)