This came out in 2003 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
There aren’t many things you can count on in this world. Thankfully, no matter how life lets you down in ways big and small, you can always rest assured that Nick Cave is having a lousier time than you. Or at least pretending to.
Over the course of a dozen solo albums and two decades, the former Birthday Party frontman and his trusty Bad Seeds have been on an endless death march through a landscape of brooding depression, tragic obsession and black-hearted murder balladry. Nocturama, as you might expect, finds them no closer to the light. Minimally decorated, languidly paced and darkly textured, most of these 10 cuts once again combine Cave’s literary narratives and croaking baritone to maximum effect, weaving mesmerizing tales of death, sin and salvation, whose bleak messages are leavened only by the sheer beauty of their performance and artistry. Every once in a while, just to startle us, Cave breaks the spell by rocking out — the hard-hitting Dead Man In My Bed lurches to a stumbling 15/8 beat, and Babe, I’m On Fire is an angular, 15-minute epic of fixation. But as a rule, Nocturama captures the dependable Cave at his best — which is to say, his worst.
