Sean O Hagan is a journalist and Nick Cave is, well, he’s Nick Cave ! Legendary Australian musician. When I picked this book up, I thought it would be a rock ‘n’ roll book and I had to chuckle as I read some of the final pages in the book, because Nick thought that’s what he was doing initially! So, I hear you asking, if it isn’t a rock ‘n’ roll book what is it? Good question.
It appears to be a protracted transcription of some telephone conversations between Nick and Sean. Clearly they know each other well and have been friends for some time. So there is an ease within the conversations and an openness that I think you get between two people who know and trust each other in a way that you don’t get with a interviewer who may in someway be distanced.
If you’re a fan of Nick Cave and you’ve followed his career in music, I guess a lot of this will be familiar. I didn’t know much about him and I had a perception that has been completely blown apart by reading this book. I found it to be a book of raw honesty and emotion. I was been unaware of the tragedy that Nick and his wife faced. And I found it quite moving to read with how they have dealt and are dealing with their loss.
So it’s a book of personal recollections from childhood through to current maturity. There’s a great deal of detailed information about the art of creating music and performing it. It’s also a book of wider philosophies regarding life with some quite profound thoughts that certainly got me thinking long after I put the book down.
‘…..you reconcile yourself to the acute jeopardy of life, and you do this by acknowledging the value in things, the precious nature of things, and savouring the time we have together in this world. You learn that the binding agent of the world is love.’
Cave has some interesting considerations of religion, not in the narrowest organised religion sense, but within a broader theology that for me, anyway, defined him as a most spiritual person.
‘ Religion is spirituality with rigour, I guess, and, yes, it makes demands on is. For me, it involves wrestling with the idea of faith – that seam of doubt that runs through the most credible religions. It’s that struggle with the notion of the divine, that is at the heart of my creativity.’
Some very powerful words here which offer much food for thought. And I’m left with that almost indescribable, delight at having a read a book that turned out to be very different from the initial perception.
Sean is an engaging interviewer seeming to ask pertinent questions and responding sensitively. And although there was a clear friendship he remained objective.
My thanks to Canongate Books for a gifted copy.
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