I used to be pretty obsessed with Nick Cave, The Bad Seeds & The Birthday Party. Unfortunately that obsession wained after Murder Ballads. While he was still the master lyricist on every album after Murder Ballads, they lacked musically. They were too boring and lacked all the unnerving tension that made every previous album so epic. I’m not sure if this had to do with founding member Blixa Bargeld eventual departure from the Bad Seeds or with Nick Cave just kicking heroin. Regardless, things just weren’t the same on Boatman’s Call, No More Shall We Part, Nocturama, & Abattoir Blues/The Lyre Of Orpheus. The Grinderman album got billed as this uproarious rocking return of Nick Cave. It definitely had more bite than everything since Murder Ballads but personally I thought it was still a bit lacking and didn’t in the least signal some triumphant return in my eyes.

When the name of Nick cave’s new album Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! was first reported on music blogs I just had this sense that this was gonna be it… the return of the Nick Cave I fell in love with in my gother days. Just the title alone triggered visions of all those tense classic older Birthday Party & Bad Seeds songs. I was really glad when my high expectations were justified upon listening to Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! This album is still too fresh in my head to anoint with rest of Nick Cave’s classic material, however on first listen this is exactly the new chapter I had always hoped would meet Nick Cave as he got older. I don’t know if it was switching from piano to organ on this album that sparked the return to form or if it was just finally getting accustomed to life without Blixa, drugs & alcohol. Either way I’m glad I still held out some hope that the good shepherd would find his way home.