Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds played an emotional show at The O2 in London last night (Saturday November 9), with the frontman taking a moment to jokingly tease touring bassist – Colin Greenwood of Radiohead.
The Bad Seeds are now some months into the European tour for their acclaimed 18th album ‘Wild God‘. Playing their second night in the capital, Cave had some fun at the expense of Greenwood – who has been the performing bassist with the band in the absence of Martyn Casey.
At one point, Cave pointed out a fan on the front row wearing a “a hideous Radiohead sweatshirt,” as he put it. “What’s worse is you have a Björk t-shirt on underneath,” Cave continued, noting that it added “insult to injury”.
Laughing with his bandmates as they looked to Greenwood, Cave corrected himself: “We love them both. Isn’t that right Colin? We stole Colin.”
Then, during the performance of the iconic ‘Red Right Hand’, Cave looked to the fan wearing the ‘In Rainbows’ hoodie once more and altered the lyrics to: “You want another shitty T-shirt? He’ll get you one.”
With the frontman in the highest of jovial spirits, other highlights of the evening included a fevered performance of the title track of ‘Wild God’, the ‘Push The Sky Away’ cut ‘Jubilee Street’ landing as a latter day Bad Seeds favourite, full-bodied live outings of ‘White Elephant’ and the title track from Cave and Warren Ellis’ lockdown album ‘Carnage‘ and ‘O Wow O Wow (How Wonderful She Is)’ being dedicated to their late, former bandmate, the “bright flame” of Anita Lane.
- READ MORE: Nick Cave interviewed: “There’s no metric that says virtuousness makes good art”
Tender moments also came when a humbled and teary-eyed Cave led the crowd through stripped-down renditions of ‘I Need You’ and the classic ‘Into My Arms’.
Look at me now.@nickcave @TheO2 pic.twitter.com/ace55tRV1w
— Andrew Trendell (@AndrewTrendell) November 10, 2024
Having previously performed with Cave live on his recent solo tours as well as several dates of the ‘Carnage’ tour with Warren Ellis, Greenwood also contributed parts to the band’s new album, ‘Wild God’, too.
“It’s an awesome group of people to play music with,” Greenwood told NME earlier this year about joining the band. “They’re brilliant and with ferociously loud drummers; what a team. For me, it’s a really fun thing to do because it’s not Radiohead. There are a lot of different colours in the music, so I’m having a blast.”
He continued: “[Cave] is such a great story-teller, and I really love his piano-playing,” Greenwood said of Cave. “When I took the rough recordings from the new album home to listen to and heard his voice fill up my front room, I thought, ‘What a voice! He’s got the lot!’”
“I knew his music of course, but I didn’t know it super-well. I knew ‘Let Love In’ and really liked that record, as well as the previous records ‘Push The Sky Away’ and ‘Skeleton Tree’, Being lucky enough to watch him work and write with Warren has been a true privilege.”
Greenwood praised the Bad Seeds music for their power and dealing in “euphoric intensity”.
“The music so powerful, passionate, emotional, involving and entrancing,” he added. “I saw Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds for the first time in 2017 in Antwerp.
“I just watched Nick hold that audience in the palm of his hand; there was this ornate soulfulness to it that I adored. To be a small part of that amazing story is an enormous honour and privilege for me.”
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds’ London setlist was:
‘Frogs’
‘Wild God’
‘Song of the Lake’
‘O Children’
‘Jubilee Street’
‘From Her to Eternity’
‘Long Dark Night’
‘Cinnamon Horses’
‘Tupelo’
‘Conversion’
‘Bright Horses’
‘Joy’
‘I Need You’
‘Carnage’
‘Final Rescue Attempt’
‘Red Right Hand’
‘The Mercy Seat’
‘White Elephant’
Encore:
‘O Wow O Wow (How Wonderful She Is)’
‘Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry’
‘The Weeping Song’
‘Into My Arms’
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds’ ‘Wild God’ tour with shows in Dublin, Birmingham and Paris, before heading to North America in 2025. You can buy tickets here for the UK and Ireland, here for Europe, and here for the US.
In a four-star review of ‘Wild God’, NME concluded: “Bad Seeds records are infamously loaded with gothic doom and gloom. Of course, this ain’t a poptastic LOLfest, and still coloured with the many shades of a life so challenging and weathered. But never has Cave been so freewheelin’ than on the giddy ‘Frogs’, ‘Jumping for love and the opening sky above’ as ‘Kris Kristofferson walks by kicking a can in a shirt he hasn’t washed for years’. With a lust for life, the once-dark prince is letting the light in.”
Meanwhile, Greenwood’S How To Disappear – a new photo book that documents the bassist’s life with Radiohead is out now. Head here for our in-depth interview with Greenwood.
He told NME how he was “sure” that Radiohead would “get together soon and make plans” about their return, while brother and guitarist Jonny Greenwood described the band’s recent reunion rehearsals as “fun and natural“. Frontman Thom Yorke, however, said that he “doesn’t give a fuck” if fans are looking forward to the band coming back for live dates and new material.
