Nicktape 6, Blood and Ghosts by Nick Groom

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

***Cross-reference with: VII, “That road it twists/ That road is crossed”

Nick Cave has been pretty clear about his musical influences on the songs chosen for Kicking Against the Pricks and in subsequent covers and tributes, and these sources locate his work primarily in dark Americana. But through American folk, blues, and country he has also absorbed traditional English, Scottish, and Irish ballad themes, and these motifs present a striking perspective on his lyrics. Occasionally these traditions are made explicit: Cave admitted that ‘Henry Lee’ was based on a Scottish ballad, and it certainly contains elements of ‘Young Hunting’ (Child 68) and ‘Sir Hugh’ (Child 155). And ‘The Willow Garden’ and ‘Knoxville Girl’ are both based in part on the 19th Century Irish song ‘Wexford Girl’, itself derived from the earlier ‘Oxford Girl’ and ultimately traceable to ‘The Cruel Miller’, a 16th Century English ballad. Other times, the traditions are implicit: ‘Come Into My Sleep’ is typical of “haunted lover” ballads, and ‘There She Goes, My Beautiful World’ and ‘Breathless’ both focus on the folk language of flowers and the countryside popular in English balladry. My essay therefore traces a particular mix of stark reality and the metaphysical (often Christianised in Cave) to suggest that the old songs echo profoundly through Nick Cave’s work – most notably on the road to Murder Ballads, but also in the supernaturalism of his environmentalist double-album Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus – The Lyre in particular being suffused with the mysterious Old English spirit of “Faërie”. It is to this world that the accompanying mixtape will, I hope, serve an as introduction.

That road it twists
That road is crossed
It’s down that road
A lot of little girls go lost

You’ll be his queen for the night
But in the morning you’ll wake
With the lords and high ladies
Of the bottom of the lake
– Cave, ‘Sugar Sugar Sugar’

1. ‘Tom Devil’
Ed Lewis and prisoners (Various, Bad Man Ballads: Songs of Outlaws and Desperadoes, The Alan Lomax Collection, Southern Journey vol. 5, Rounder CD 1705)

2. ‘Turpin Hero’
Ewan MacColl (Ewan MacColl, A. L. Lloyd, and Roy Harris, Bold Sportsmen All: Gamblers and Sporting Blades, Topic TSCD495)

3. ‘Naomi Wise’
Clarence Ashley (Various, People Take Warning: Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs, 1913 1938, Tompkins Square, TSQ1875)

4. ‘Young Waters’
June Tabor (June Tabor, Airs and Graces, Topic TSCD298)

5. ‘Long Lankin’
The Devil’s Interval (The Devil’s Interval, Blood and Honey, WildGoose WGS 335 CD)

6. ‘The Cruel Ship’s Carpenter’
Jackie Oates (Jackie Oates, Jackie Oates, Hands on Music HMCD25)

7. ‘Cruel Mother’
The Dunns (The Dunns, The Dunns, self-released [first version])

8. ‘Two Sisters’
Andrew Bird (Andrew Bird, Music of Hair, self-released)

9. ‘There Was a Lady All Skin and Bone’
Jim Causley (Jim Causley, Lost Love Found, WildGoose WGS 348 CD)

10 ‘Death and the Lady’
Ian King (Ian King, Panic Grass & Fever Few, Fledg’ling FLED 3082)

11. ‘My Lady’s Coach’
Paul Wilson, Marilyn Tucker, Bob Yinker and Ellen Thomson (Various, Dead Maid’s Land: Traditional Songs from Devon and Cornwall from the Collection of Sabine Baring-Gould, WildGoose WGS 292 CD)

12. ‘Thomas the Rhymer’
Ron Taylor and Jeff Gillett (Ron Taylor and Jeff Gillett, Both Shine As One, WildGoose WGS334)

13. ‘Tam Lin’
Frankie Armstrong (Various, Ballads, Fellside FECD110)

14. ‘Lyke-Wake Dirge’/ ‘I Am Stretched on Your Grave’
The Dunns (The Dunns, The Dunns, self-released)

AND 15. ‘The Bells of Paradise’
Alva [Vivien Ellis and Giles Lewin] (Alva, The Bells of Paradise, Beautiful Jo BEJOCD-45)

***Some parallels:

This is a list of suggested parallels to Cave’s work, but I didn’t want to labour this point by repeating familiar Cave material on a mixtape containing what I hope are striking new tracks for the listener. I’ve also tried to make the mix hang together as a coherent collection. The essay should of course be read while listening to the music.

       – N.G.

‘Tom Devil’ – ‘Well of Misery’/ ‘Black Crow King’
‘Turpin Hero’ – ‘King Kong Kitchee Kitchee Ki-Mi-O’
‘Naomi Wise’ – ‘Deep in the Woods’/ ‘Sad Waters’/ ‘Sugar Sugar Sugar’
‘Young Waters’ – ‘Red Right Hand’
‘Long Lankin’ – ‘Song of Joy’
‘The Cruel Ship’s Carpenter’ – ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’/ ‘The Kindness of Strangers’
‘Cruel Mother’ – ‘O Children’
‘Two Sisters’ – ‘The Curse of Milhaven’/ ‘The Ballad of Robert Moore and Betty Coltrane’
‘There Was a Lady All Skin and Bone’ – ‘Dead Man In My Bed’
‘Death and the Lady’ – ‘I Let love In’/ ‘A Grief Came Riding’
‘My Lady’s Coach’ – ‘Crow Jane’
‘Thomas the Rhymer’ – ‘There is a Town’ (see also “Queen of Faërie” songs under ‘Tam Lin’)
‘Tam Lin’ – ‘Do You Love Me?’/ ‘Ain’t Gonna Rain Anymore’/ ‘Lovely Creature’/ ‘She Passed By My Window’/ ‘Nature Boy’/ ‘Supernaturally’/ ‘Spell’
‘Lyke-Wake Dirge’/ ‘I Am Stretched on Your Grave’ – ‘Time Jesum Transeuntum Et Non Revertentum’
‘The Bells of Paradise’ – ‘Let the Bells Ring’