I’m not sure I took much notice the first time I heard Nick Cave in any form: a song by The Birthday Party played by Kaz on The Nightmare Lounge, our WFMU show, circa 1987. But that’s the same year Wim Wenders released his masterpiece, Wings Of Desire, which includes a scene where one of the main characters – Marion (Solveig Dommartin, RIP), the circus trapeze artist – listens to The Carny from the album Your Funeral… My Trial by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Later in the film, Marion meets the now-humanized angel Damiel (Bruno Ganz, RIP) at a hotel bar as the band plays the same number onstage, segueing into From Her To Eternity. Traveling into Manhattan to see Wings Of Desire at a long-gone movie house, Nick Cave hardly registered with me. By the time the film ended I knew two things: I had to get the soundtrack (its ethereal score by Jürgen Knieper quickly became Nightmare Lounge and, later, Aerial View bed music) and some Nick Cave records. I say “get” and not “buy” because WFMU had the soundtrack, The Birthday Party and Nick Cave records and a cassette deck perfect for surreptitious dubbing (I handled the soundtrack but it was Kaz who put together a Nick Cave mix tape for me, hand-lettering the J-card as only a cartoonist can).
Delving into Nick’s various back catalogs I wondered why it took me so long to discover this singular artist when I knew of fellow Australians The Saints since discovering punk rock circa 1978 as the Sex Pistols toured America. But as someone who considered himself a bad seed from way back, I was soon smitten with Nick’s Grand Guignol theatricality and themes. This was dark, absurd, dramatic End Times music and I was there for it. I’ve followed Nick Cave’s burgeoning career since, buying the records and seeing him with the Bad Seeds twice and on one of his solo tours where I asked a question from the audience (don’t ask me what). Somewhere in between he was a guest of the SiriusXM show Freeweelin’ while on a PR tour for his 2009 book The Death Of Bunny Munro. Those 20 or so minutes remain the most nervous stretch I’ve experienced during an interview, despite having asked questions of everyone from Carol Burnett to Robert Duvall to Tom Jones. For me, Nick Cave is the epitome of seemingly effortless cool, an erudite, stylish multi-hyphenate able to write music, books, film scores, a newsletter and, as performer, rivet your gaze. But when I heard about the current Wild God tour via the aforementioned newsletter, The Red Hand Files, I checked ticket prices for the nearest venue, the Barclays Center in downtown Brooklyn. Decent seats were upwards of $300 and choice seats were over $400. Fuck me.
Then, last week, something extraordinary happened. A pair of complementary tickets to Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds at Barclays Center fell in my lap courtesy of Michael Weston King of My Darling Clementine (you may have noticed me promoting their recent North American tour right here in this newsletter). I’ve known Michael, his wife Lou Dagleish and their daughters Florence and Mabel since interviewing them on Freewheelin’ a dozen or more years ago. We’ve remained friends since and when I learned they’d be here this April I offered any material support I could. The last time Michael reached out for help he asked if I’d be willing to pick up daughter Flo and new husband Alex – due to be married the following day – at JFK August 2 and shuttle them to their Manhattan hotel. I responded, asking for 24 hours to determine if I needed to drive upstate. It turned out I did, and I wrote back to Michael July 30, offering to instead drive the newlyweds out to JFK for their return flight August 9. What Michael wrote back moments later haunts me still. He said the wedding and honeymoon were off due to his 6 year-old granddaughter BeBe and two other young girls being murdered in Southport. I’d read about the horrific stabbings committed by a deranged 17 year-old targeting a dance studio and dimly recalled Michael mentioning he was from that part of Northern England, not far from Liverpool, but couldn’t imagine someone I know being so intimately impacted. To hear he’d lost his granddaughter, Flo and Mabel’s niece, was an utter gut punch. When Michael sent the 2025 My Darling Clementine tour itinerary (which had been set prior to the stabbings) a month later, I said I’d help fill in a few of the empty dates. Calling and emailing northeast venues out of the blue to pitch a band most didn’t know was harder than I thought. Michael was having better luck, so I offered to procure instruments (acoustic guitar, stage piano) instead. The guitar was easy – I’d loan Michael my recently-acquired 1969 Gibson J45, acquired through vigorous horse-trading and set right (it suffered action and intonation issues) via yet more swapping (a 1959 Gibson LG-0 acoustic guitar) by a Brooklyn-based luthier and Lark Street Music, where a used Fishman pickup was installed. The keyboard was proving a heavier lift. Lou plays a Kawai ES120 digital piano back in England and I wanted to get her something as good or better. She had few requirements – graded action, a great grand piano sound – and I went down a deep rabbit hole researching what would fit the bill (I am now an expert on Kawai versus Roland versus Yamaha digital or stage – the terms are used interchangeably – pianos). Back on March 17 I bought a used Kawai ES120 in white on EBay, paying the Buy It Now price of $383.85 via PayPal. I immediately contacted the seller to arrange local pickup in New Rochelle but days went by with no reply. Then I did what I should’ve initially: I checked the seller’s profile. He’d supposedly been an EBay member for years but had only one sale. The red flags were piling up, so I canceled the sale. A few days later, EBay wrote back to tell me it was too late to cancel and I should have my order by April 1. I tried to explain that this was a local pickup and the seller hadn’t responded to set a time or tell me where but you try arguing with a robot. Thus began a harrowing, convoluted journey through the hell that is EBay and PayPal AI-powered chatbots and human customer service – including an hour talking with someone in the Philippines, where seemingly all phone-based customer service is now centered. I then fucked myself over through impatience, canceling my EBay money-back guarantee refund request because it was going to take too long. I tried my luck with PayPal but that was going to take even longer, so I went back to EBay… who told me they couldn’t reopen a refund request because I was working through PayPal. I’d stranded myself in No Man’s Land, out a decent chunk of change and with no piano for the soon-to-be-arriving band. It was Hail Mary time. I put in another PayPal request, lying that the seller had agreed to refund me, and waited. Meanwhile, I ordered a new Kawai ES60 (very similar to the ES120 with less features but weighing in at a lighter and unheard of 24 lbs.) digital piano, dust cover and accessory kit (stand, bench, sustain pedal) from B&H. I also bought a used Kawai carrying case on Amazon.
The band would be flying into Chicago April 2, with three shows planned in Canada (one in New London, two in Toronto), so I also found a Canadian music store chain that rents instruments (Michael explained how dicey it’d be to drive into Canada with instruments but no work permit) and reserved an acoustic guitar and stage piano. For the US shows the plan was for me to drive my instruments north and meet the band prior to their Boston City Winery gig. They’d keep my instruments all the way back to Chicago, then drop them off with the son of a friend of mine. My friend would shuttle the guitar/keys back to me next time he traveled east to see his Dad in Manhattan. If all went to plan, I’d have my gear back by middle of May.
I haven’t been to Boston since the 1990s while working for NPR and I was looking forward to staying overnight just prior to the 250th anniversary of Paul Revere’s ride and the “shot heard ‘round the world.” I’d hopefully have time to do the patriotic tourist bit before the show. Things change and Michael soon let me know the band lost two of the Canadian gigs and the City Winery show. They compensated with a show not far from Chicago in Grass Lake, Michigan and kept the Toronto house concert, playing both with borrowed instruments. I pivoted my trip to Providence, where they’d be playing another house concert the night after the canceled Boston show, and helped the band by booking them rooms at our favorite local hotel, the Wedding Cake House (I managed to get a room at The Dean). April 9th I drove up to Providence, arriving around 1 PM. I parked at the Wedding Cake House and had a quick lunch at the excellent Nick’s On Broadway just across the street while waiting for the band to return from wherever they’d gone. Michael messaged me within the hour and soon I was meeting him at the hotel to move the piano, etc, to the back of his rented van. We took the Gibson inside so Michael could get acquainted with it in the hotel’s large common room. While Michael strummed we discussed the other dates on the tour and I said I’d help with further Northeast accommodations (I ended up booking them into four more hotels). We also talked about his granddaughter and what had happened after the stabbings. When a rumor went around about the murderer being an immigrant, England exploded in a series of nationalist riots until the families of the dead girls stepped in and said Not in our names. Michael’s son and daugher-in-law – BeBe’s father and mother – and the other families met with the King and Queen and Prime Minister, all offering condolences and vowing to see to it this would never happen again. I’d done some reading about the mentally ill teenager at the center of it all and it was obvious he’d fallen through every possible crack in England’s Prevent program (analogous to our red flag laws, Prevent allows the authorities to step in when there’s evidence of an impending attack, removing weapons, etc.). I asked Michael “As an American, I’d like to know who’s getting sued.”
Before the Providence house concert I managed to get myself over to my niece's place in West Warwick to meet my newest great-nephew, not yet a year old. It was also the day before my sister's birthday, so me, my niece, her husband, their baby and my sister had a quick dinner before I headed to the east side of Providence for the show. It went well, with Flo and Mabel doing an Everly Brothers number at the end. The next morning I was up before 7 AM and on the road home not long after. The band set off towards Bethlehem, PA and we met up again Friday night at The Turning Point in Piermont, NY, Sweet T. and two of our neighbors in tow. Sunday we drove up to the Catskills for their show at The Colony in Woodstock.
Back home on Monday I had some good news: PayPal found in my favor and I’d get my money back in a few days. But then I began to get nervous about the plan to return my gear in Chicago. It was now looking as if there might not be a hand-off between my son’s friend in Chicago and my friend in Cincinnati until June. My friend wasn’t due to head east again until late August/early September. The plan all along was to sell the piano, etc., as quickly as possible to recoup some of what I paid. Shit. I let Michael know I’d have to switch things up and retrieve the instruments after their upcoming Washington, DC show. This would leave them scrambling for replacements for the remaining shows (Wheeling, WV and Chicago) but I didn’t know what else to do. I began making yet more calls, trying to find a music store between DC and Wheeling that’d rent instruments for return in Chicago. Forget it. No national chain allows you to pick up in one location and return to another. Pivoting again, I called the owner of the Wheeling venue, thinking his sound crew might know someone with instruments to loan. It didn’t go well. I threw the poor guy into a panic, wondering if he’d be forced to cancel a sold-out show and refund a hundred patrons their ticket price. I kept dialing and at some point, Michael messaged again, offering the Nick Cave tickets. He’d gotten them for the newlyweds, a gift from a friend in the Bad Seeds, but Flo and Alex, who run a small theater near Liverpool, had already bought tickets for Cabaret. Between desperate phone calls in search of a guitar and piano, I reached out to friends with an offer to see Nick Cave in Brooklyn. My old friend and fellow Mermaid Parade regular, Chief Justice Mark accepted and we made plans for a pre-dinner nosh at Junior’sThursday night. While checking Apple Maps for yet more music stores near Wheeling, I zoomed out and had a revelation: between Wheeling and Chicago the band would pass just north of Cincinnati. I did some quick arithmetic and realized they’d need to detour a little over an hour, which was nothing considering the amount of driving they’d done. I checked with my friend in Ohio, then confirmed the plan with Michael. We were all good. The band would still need to figure instruments out for their Chicago house concert but Michael was certain it’d happen. I called the owner of the Wheeling venue and left him off the hook.
Thursday I took two ferries and a bus to Junior’s, meeting Mark around 6 PM. We ate and got caught up, then walked 15 minutes to Barclays Center. I haven’t been to downtown Brooklyn (I’m forever visiting Coney Island) in eons and couldn’t believe how thoroughly it’s been transformed. The money stink is on everything. Still convinced we’d never get in to see Nick Cave (the tickets weren’t in my name and the Barclays website said ID was required), I told Mark not to thank me until we were seated. The woman at the Will Call window didn’t even blink as she handed over an envelope with tickets, wristbands and an invite to a VIP afterparty, so through the metal detectors we went. We found our way to Section 7, row 16 where the half a gummy I had after dinner began to take effect. Within 15 minutes the band was on stage, the opener – St. Vincent – having wrapped up 30 minutes prior. Mark and I had excellent seats but were immediately on our feet and stood through the first three songs. No sooner do we sit our asses back down when this 30-ish couple (pictured above) appear in the mostly empty row in front of us. The dude had a top-knot, the woman emitted witchy Stevie Nicks vibes and I found myself unwittingly entering a Portlandia sketch when, after two more songs, I tapped Top-Knot on the shoulder and asked “Are you sitting down any time soon?” Witchy Nicks turned on me and began frantically shouting something that began with We are not sitting down… and only ended when I said “I CAN’T HEAR A WORD YOU’RE SAYING.” Top-Knot began doing this stupid, endless Axl Rose snake-hips dance and Witchy Nicks proceeded to hold her phone over her head directly in front of me, shooting copious videos. I asked Mark what drugs they were on, telling him, “I’m guessing Ecstasy.”
Nah. I don’t think so. I’ll tell you why later.
“Maybe cocaine? They won’t shut the fuck up.”
Indeed, they talked through almost every song. When she wasn’t shooting overhead videos, Witchy Nicks posted on social media and texted God-knows-who. Soon, a woman showed up in their row, taking up a spot to the left of Top-Knot. Leaning across him, Witchy Nicks shouted to her newly-arrived friend Aren’t these seats much better?!
Fucking interlopers! They don’t even belong here!
For a moment I thought of grabbing an usher but didn’t want to exit a Portlandia sketch only to enter a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode. If I’d paid full price for the seats, maybe. But in the grand scheme of things, fuck Top-Knot and Witchy Nicks. FAR more offensive than never sitting, always talking and non-stop phone use was the song they kept requesting at the top of their lungs, prompting my question to a certain Nick Cave newsletter:
I’ve submitted many questions to The Red Hand Files but this is my latest: At your recent Brooklyn show, the couple in front of my friend and I acted like self-involved boors, standing throughout, holding their phones over their heads to shoot video and shouting requests for “STAGGER LEE!” Of all the Nick Cave titles one might request at a show WHY THAT ONE?! To me, it’s a cover – a great one – with a ton of cursing. But out of your ENTIRE CATALOG to repeatedly yell for Stagger Lee demonstrates to me a lack of familiarity with your output, no? (BTW, I requested “The Curse of Milhaven” which didn’t materialize.) How do you feel about shouted requests? And which ones are shouted at you more than others? I realize this is a multi-part question but since none of my previously submitted questions have ever been answered, feel free to go into depth on your response. LOVE YOU, NICK!
Let’s see if Nick responds…
I left as the opening bars of The Mercy Seat rang out, determined to be back at the NY Waterway Midtown Ferry Terminal before the last boat (11:50 PM) back to Weehawken. Thanks to a $36 Lyft, I was. Somewhere between Brooklyn and Manhattan Michael responded to my message thanking him again for the tickets, saying he might like to buy my Gibson after all (he’d mentioned the possibility early on). Friday we went back and forth on price, arriving at something that’d compensate me for both the guitar and piano, etc. We arranged for him to drop the cash off with the Kawai in Cincinnati Saturday and my friend said he’d PayPal the equivalent the same day.
I’m sad to let go of yet another Gibson acoustic (the 1959 LG-0 was my first) but never truly bonded with the instrument, having hardly played it. And, truth be told, it’s not the one I would’ve gotten had I not stumbled into it. My heart is set on a vintage Gibson Hummingbird or Country Western (I’d also settle for a Southern Jumbo). Stay tuned.
Today, I heard from Michael. Everyone’s back safe and sound in England, Flo and Alex having eloped at City Hall while in New York. Sadly, I couldn’t give them that ride out to JFK (we were at Easter brunch with my mother-in-law in Princeton) but we look forward to everyone’s return sometime in 2026.
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Tupelo - Barclay's Center, April 17, 2025