Theories, rants, etc.
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WHAT ARE ALBUMS ABOUT, AND WHEN does an artist find out the meaning of their own work? For some, overarching concepts are baked into a project from the off. But for others, themes can accumulate subconsciously, only coalescing when the recording has finished and promotion has begun.
“I was worried about this interview because I was like, Fuck, what is this record even about?” Nick Cave admits to Dorian Lynskey in our cover story this month. It’s a startling confession from a man whose relationship with journalists has generally been more frictional than anxious – Cave did, after all, call our former Editor Mat Snow a “miserable shitwringing turd” in 1986’s Scum.
Artists evolve, of course, and Wild God finds Cave and The Bad Seeds entering a new phase of their career, something Cave does a tremendous job of explaining
to us in spite of his initial uncertainty. It’s one of MOJO’s privileges that we often speak to our heroes as they start the interview process around a new record, and this issue we have an especially moving story to tell. “Regardless of how bad it seems, we just keep doing beautiful things,” Cave says. “And that’s what the record feels like to me.”