Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – ‘Push the Sky Away’
By all accounts, Push the Sky Away was supposed to be just another album. Nick Cave was back after a half-decade away from the recording studio, but everything else seemed the same. The Bad Seeds, his longtime backing band, were as solid as a group could be. Producer Nick Launay, who had produced three previous three Bad Seeds albums, was back as well. It all seemed like business as usual.
And then Mick Harvey quit. The guitarist had been Cave’s right-hand man since their days in Australia’s most chaotic post-punk quintet, The Birthday Party. Harvey had the most essential role within Cave’s inner circle: co-writer, arranger, business manager, and close confidant, among many others. Harvey was as much “The Bad Seeds” as anyone else.
But in the years leading up to Push the Sky Away, Harvey’s role as Cave’s foil had largely been taken over by Warren Ellis. Ellis first joined the group on 1994’s Let Love In and officially became a Bad Seed in 1997. Over the next 15 years, Cave and Ellis became closer collaborators, working together in both The Bad Seeds and as film composers for movies like The Road and The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford.
As Cave and Ellis grew as a writing team, Harvey was pushed further to the edges. While his contributions to the band continued to be notable, his disagreements with Ellis getting the main say in arrangements led to conflict. With his musical contributions waning, Harvey decided to leave the group, cutting off his collaboration with Cave that spanned three decades.
As one classic member left, another rejoined the fold. Founding member Barry Adamson hadn’t contributed to a Bad Seeds record since 1986’s Your Funeral… My Trial. He came in at the tail-end of production, contributing bass to just two of the album’s tracks. He would be gone in less than two years’ time, but his presence represents the struggle and yearning for identity that sits at the heart of Push the Sky Away.
With little regard for some of the more aggressive aspects of his sound, Cave instead crafts the album like a meditation session. Each song on Push the Sky Away strives to find a single standout moment. While attempting to catch the fleeting bits of inspiration, the Bad Seeds wait with calm patience.
Those moments do come, but the listener has to be equally patient. It’s the shutting down of the fun fair on ‘Wide Lovely Eyes’ and the subtle cracks in Cave’s voice on ‘Higgs Boson Blues’. Sometimes, Cave fakes you out: ‘Jubilee Street’ unfurls at a languid pace, with Cave trying to pull you into the story he’s spinning. Meanwhile, it’s Ellis’ haunting strings that leave the most lasting impression.
Nobody in the band seems particularly interested in filling out the spaces in each song’s composition. Tracks like ‘Water’s Edge’ and ‘We Real Cool’ take Martyn P. Casey’s bass out as far and long as it can go, with little in the way of additional accompaniment. The starkness of Push the Sky Away might make the album seem incomplete at times, but the longer you stay with the bare-bones arrangements, the more haunting they get.
Cave himself has rarely been better, embracing the storytelling side of his lyrical bent and following it down whatever rabbit hole it takes him. Whether it’s pushing a surreal kind of romance on ‘Mermaids’ or bringing his thematic side out for a reprise on ‘Finishing Jubilee Street’, Cave crafts the album like a non-linear story. All of the songs are essential pieces, but it’s not always clear where they fit into the narrative.
In its very bones, Push the Sky Away is crafted to highlight raw minimalism and small revelations. Cave isn’t always successful when it comes to crafting a bigger picture to fit all his ideas into, but strewn throughout the album are enough tiny moments of joy and surprise that it adds up to something much bigger. Push the Sky Away might be too small for some, but for Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, it was another chapter in a fascinating ongoing story.
