Sombre replies

I've spent a good hour wrestling with No More Shall We Part, which is surprising, because I expected it would be far easier going. At the moment, it feels even denser and more serious than The Boatman's Call, and that's saying something. Quite a few songs come across as samey-sounding, which is always a bit disappointing, and it's invariably the slower songs. Thing is, there are lots of slower songs; maybe a quarter of them are really energetic, the rest are slow piano-driven songs. I find the best songs to be the ones that really build up an atmosphere, like the brilliant "Oh My Lord", which is by far the best song here (although the first track, "As I Sat Sadly By Her Side", is strong as well).

It's definitely gloomy stuff, and Cave sounds very tired on most of them. I think it's the first instance where you can hear him straining his voice; it sounded great on The Boatman's Call, but he seems to be losing it slowly here.

Of course, just because it's dense and gloomy doesn't mean it has no worth. Enjoyable it may not be, but there probably is more to it than meets the eye.

Update: It took nearly a year for me to re-listen to it. I don't think it's as bad as the above makes it out to be, in fact the songwriting is fairly strong throughout. Dense? Hardly! I'd say it's much easier going than The Boatman's Call. Oh, and "As I Sat Sadly By Her Side" is the best thing on here, make no mistake; no offense to "Oh My Lord", but the opener could be one of Cave's finest compositions of his career. But that's just the euphoria talking...

Berlin also was tough going, and indeed set a bad precedent for the rest of the day. I found myself wading through a lot of soft, almost spoken word intonations by Reed, only to reach the somewhat uplifting "Sad Song" (which, despite the title, is anything but). I remember thinking about this album much earlier in the year, wondering whether it would be an epic tale (for some reason Hamlet came to mind). The initial verdict? Not quite! I suppose that's to be expected with really moody pieces; they really do need a lot of time to stir up some genuine feeling.