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Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Tender Prey Audio CD

A fair review of the Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds "Tender Prey" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds reviews here, or go back to the Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds tabs.

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds Band: Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Title: Tender Prey
Rating:
Release Date: 1992-07-28
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Mercy Seat 2: Up Jumped the Devil 3: Deanna 4: Watching Alice 5: Mercy 6: City of Refuge 7: Slowly Goes the Night 8: Sunday's Slave 9: Sugar Sugar Sugar 10: New Morning 11: Mercy Seat [Video Mix]

No tender songs for me
That doesn't mean that our favorite mad preacher is up for cheap melodies and easy listening. "Tender prey" pretty much marks the border between Nick Cave's raw, more experimental albums ("From her to eternity", "First born is dead" and "Your funeral, my trial") and more accessable song collections that would follow with "The Good son", "Henry's dream" and further.
The opener here is the instant classic "The mercy seat", a haunting, seven minute monologue of a convict strapped in the electric chair. A verbal play about self doubt, conviction and unbearable knowledge of the Old Testaments's rage unfolds. The music is one stunning build-up to the inevitable end.
The three Bad Seeds dvd's which are available now, "The Video's" and the live performances "God is in the house" and "LIve at the Paradiso" all contain the song.
The documentary annex roadmovie video "The road to God knows where" shows a scene in which Nick Cave and the boys perform an accoustic version for a radio station, the live album "Live seeds" has it as the blasting first song, and when I saw Oncle Nick and his Bad Seeds in November 2004 at The Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam, Holland, 'THe mercy seat' was good enough for the closing of the second encore.
That shows how this one song still stands up against time.

Other tracks include the sing-along rocksongs "Deanna" and "The city of refuge"; the angry sounding, half sung / half spoken word "Up jumped the devil" and the brooding, sinister pledge "Mercy", for me the highlight on this album (or the absolute depth, depends on which point of view you have on the world. )

Cave is the raging carnivore here, the mad musical stalker on stage, but O how we love to surrender ourselves to him, making us easy, willing prey. . . .


uneven effort
There are some stand out tracks such as "Deanna" and "Mercy", but many of the rest come off as either overwrought or overly bombastic. While it seems to be the tendency of many Cave fans to drool over anything the man records, this is not an album that is up to par with many of his other efforts. Obviously, if you're already a fan, you'll want this disc regardless, but to anyone new to Nick Cave's work I recommend his "Best of" collection or "The Boatman's Call".


Cave's Best Album!! Moody and Rockin'!!
Gloomy Artiste at Work in Desolate City. This album always makes me think of East Berlin, when there was an East Berlin. . . however, I'm not even sure if was recorded there (in 1987-8). The songs range from the searingly intense "Mercy Seat" to the punk rocker "Deana" to the impishly wicked "Up Jumped the Devil" to the mournful, pleading "Have Mercy", etc. Half these songs rock and half are very moody and melodic, with pretty piano lines way up in the mix. Nick's voice is in top demonic/tender crooner form throughout, and this album is as cool as the black and red motif of the CD cover picture. One of the greatest albums of the 1980's, and in my opinion, this is Nick's finest work.
It's wicked, it's fun, it's pretty, all at once. It's an ABSOLUTE MUST if you like Nick Cave!.


This is a classic.
"Up Jumped The Devil" is maybe the most amazing track here - tongue-in-cheek Vaudevillian Villainy! "Mercy" is smooth and beautiful, making use of his off-key yet melodious baritone croon, and "Sugar Sugar Sugar" would be awful if it weren't for the honest portrayal of self-loathing and helplessness just under the surface of the lyrics. Even aside from the brooding, epic brilliance of "The Mercy Seat", this album is just raw-nerve, edgy, genius Nick at the height of his strung-out, violent, and delicate glory. I love the frustration of a flawed line like "Must I kill that c*cks*cker every day?"
I still don't know if Nick wrote better quality stuff before or after he cleaned up, and I don't think it matters - he's still sexy as hell, and literate as the devil, when he's singing gentle love songs - but this is a defining album of the middle phase of his brilliant career.


Why this guy has such a loyal following...
He is an icon of underground punk/alt/goth music and not many people have actually heard him. Nick Cave. The end of Johnny Cash's career sparked a masterpeice cover song of "The Mercy Seat. " Even The Man In Black couldn't capture the intensity with which Nick Cave sings that song. . . it is terrifying and beautiful all at once. "The Mercy Seat," the first track on TENDER PREY is the perfect intro to what I think is one of the greatest albums of all time.

This is the album in which the true talent of the Bad Seeds really shows through the dark wittiness of Cave's lyrics. The guitar from Mick is truly groundbreaking. Every song on this cd is amazing. I had a nightmare one night that was the story told in "Watching Alice. " I literally dreamed the song.

If you happen to read this, and maybe you have heard someone say HEY CHECK OUT NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS, please TAKE THE ADVICE. These guys are no joke. They can play thier asses off and Nick is one of the greatest songwriters of all time. . .

The fact that they are not famous in America speaks volumes on how our taste in music, as a whole society, has gone downhill.
Buy this one folks while you can and pass it on to your children.



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You can see a complete list of all Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds discography, or go back to the Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.

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