I ain't down here for your love or money, I'm down here for your POLL: The ILM Nick Cave Poll RESULTS Thread (#106 in a series)

deserving winner

i was starting to question my sanity there for a moment. great work charlie and thanks very much for doing this. loved it.

Feel like Mercy Seat was the inevitable number one, but surprised that Roses was outside the top 40. It was the first Cave song I heard so maybe I have a sentimental attachment...

1. Stranger Than Kindness
2. Tupelo
3. Wanted Man
4. From Her To Eternity
5. Sad Waters
6. The Mercy Seat
7. Your Funeral My Trial
8. Knockin’ On Joe
9. The Carny
10. The Ship Song
11. Red Right Hand
12. Into My Arms
13. City Of Refuge
14. In The Ghetto
15. Black Betty
16. Stagger Lee
17. The Weeping Song
18. There She Goes My Beautiful World
19. Higgs Boson Blues
20. Get Ready For Love

1.Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Your Funeral My Trial
2. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - The Firstborn Is Dead
3. The Birthday Party - The Bad Seed EP
4. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Kicking Against The Pricks
5. The Birthday Party - Mutiny! EP

The Birthday Party - Sonny’s Burning
The Birthday Party - Wild World
The Birthday Party - Deep In The Woods
The Birthday Party - Mutiny In Heaven
The Birthday Party - Zoo Music Girl
The Birthday Party - Big Jesus Trash Can
The Birthday Party - Release The Bats
The Birthday Party - Nick The Stripper
The Birthday Party - The Hair Shirt
Die Haut - Pleasure Is The Boss
Lydia Lunch / Honeymoon In Red - Done Dun
Lydia Lunch / Honeymoon In Red - Dead In The Head
Grinderman - No Pussy Blues
Boys Next Door - Shivers
Anita Lane - Lost In Music

i'm not sure it was inevitable! it was only 33 points ahead of the the second-place entry.

my #2! the mercy seat rules

thank you stirmonster. glad you enjoyed it!

I forgot how much of a blast these are to run. I'll do another one anytime (anytime I have the time, that is).

FHTE & Mercy Seat were kinda nipping at each other's heels the whole way.

btw Roses got two votes (36 points)

Your Funeral My Trial
The Mercy Seat
Stranger Than Kindness
I Need you
Jack’s Shadow
Slowly Goes the Night
Do You Love Me? (part 2)
O Children
From Her to Eternity
Blind Lemon Jefferson
Ain’t Gonna Rain Anymore
The Good Son
Stagger Lee
Deanna
Sad Waters
Do You Love Me?
Henry Lee
Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
City of Refuge
The Ship Song

Your Funeral... My Trial
Tender Prey
Let Love In
Skeleton Tree
Murder Ballads

40. Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! 109 points (6 votes)
39. Loverman 110 points (6 votes)
=37. Into My Arms 112 points (5 votes)
=37. Up Jumped the Devil 112 points (6 votes)
=35. O Children 114 points (5 votes)
=35. Mercy 114 points (6 votes)
34. Brother, My Cup is Empty 118 points (6 votes)
=32. Wanted Man 121 points (5 votes)
=32. Henry Lee 121 points (6 votes)
31. Jack’s Shadow 123 points (5 votes, one number one)
30. Loom of the Land 124 points (4 votes, one number one)
29. By the Time I Get to Phoenix 129 points (5 votes)
28. Jack the Ripper 131 points (6 votes, one number one)
27. I Let Love In 132 points (7 votes)
26. Lime Tree Arbour 135 points (6 votes, one number one)
25. City of Refuge 139 points (7 votes)
=23 Cabin Fever! 140 points (6 votes)
=23 Red Right Hand 140 points (8 votes)
22. (I’ll Love You) Till the End of the World 142 points (6 votes)
21. O’Malley’s Bar 144 points (6 votes)
20. Nobody’s Baby Now 147 points (6 votes)
19. Saint Huck 160 points (7 votes)
18. Straight to You 161 points (7 votes, one number one)
17. We Call Upon the Author 167 points (8 votes)
16. Sad Waters 185 points (7 votes, one number one)
15. There She Goes My Beautiful World 186 points (7 votes)
14. Higgs Boson Blues 192 points (9 votes, one number one)
13. The Weeping Song 203 points (9 votes)
12. Jubilee Street 207 points (7 votes, two number ones)
11. The Ship Song 208 points (10 votes)
10. Deanna 215 points (9 votes, two number ones)
9. Babe, I’m On Fire 217 points (8 votes, one number one)
8. Stagger Lee 236 points (9 votes, one number one)
7. Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry 249 points (11 votes)
6. Do You Love Me 304 points (13 votes, two number ones)
5. Your Funeral My Trial 400 points (13 votes, three number ones)
4. Tupelo 424 points (18 votes)
3. Stranger than Kindness 431 points (14 votes, three number ones)
2. From Her to Eternity 467 points (19 votes, one number one)
1. The Mercy Seat 500 points (18 votes, one number one)

Great work, charlie rex, thanks!

"The Mercy Seat" was almost certainly his first track to pique my interest, when I was... 13 or something. So that's all perfectly agreeable, even though I left it to others to vote for it.

thanks for this charlie, it's been both illuminating and fun

top 5 is great, some surprises in 6-10 for me!

your funeral my trial was my #1 song (not my #1 album as I mistakenly stated upthread) - it's just got an atmosphere like nothing else, this stately torch-song vibe but with a textual weirdness that pretty much disappeared after tender prey or so - the perfect mid-point between his post-punk art tendencies and later classicism - and the bass playing (Barry Adamson I'm pretty sure) is absolutely immortal

the mercy seat is the proper number one isn't it - I remember JJJ (Australian national "indie" station) did a 100 best songs of all time countdown at some point in the 1990s and The Mercy Seat came in at 97 or something - they spoke to Nick Cave and the exchange went something like this:

CLUELESS YOOF DJ: Hey Nick! The Mercy Seat just got voted the 97th greatest song of all time by JJJ listeners! How do you feel about that!?!
NICK CAVE: Pretty shit actually
CLULESS YOOF DJ: Oh? Why is that?
NICK CAVE: Well, do you really think there are 96 songs that are better than The Mercy Seat?

My ballot:

Songs:

1. Your Funeral, My Trial
2. Stranger than Kindness
3. The Mercy Seat
4. Abattoir Blues
5. Jubilee Street
6. Until The End of the World
7. Hiding All Away
8. City of Refuge
9. New MOrning
10. Mercy
11. Tupelo
12. Brompton Oratory
13. From Her to Eternity
14. Night of the Lotus Eaters
15. Deanna
16. Lucy
17. The Train Song
18 The Ship Song
19. Messiah Ward
20. Lime Tree Arbour

Non-Bad Seeds songs (only 11):

1. Wild World
2. Sonny’s Burning
3. Shivers
4. Nick The Stripper
5. She’s Hit
6. In The Woods
7. Mutiny in Heaven
8. Pleasure Heads
9. Big Jesus Trash Can
10. Hamlet (Pow Pow Pow)
11. Mr Clarinet

Albums:

1. Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus
2. Your Funeral, My Trial
3. The Boatman's Call
4. Tender Prey
5. The Good Son

BABE I'M ON FIRE was my #1 obvs

also any votes for songs from 'no more shall we part' were probably from me

thank you king charles!

I rarely vote in ILM ballot polls ... partly because my preferences always seem at odds enough with everyone else's for me to feel weird and out of sorts ... this was another of those.

mercy seat is a little predictable at #1, but it's a good enough song that i can't complain too much

here's my tracks ballot:
Jubilee Street
Galleon Ship
Hollywood
Stagger Lee
From Her to Eternity
Babe, I'm On Fire
O Children
Bright Horses
Hiding All Away
Higgs Boson Blues
Loverman
Messiah Ward
Straight to You
There She Goes, My Beautiful World
Into My Arms
Night Raid
I Had a Dream, Joe
Push the Sky Away
Lie Down Here (& Be My Girl)
We Call Upon the Author

My non-placers were fairly numerous this time around:

BAD SEEDS
Slowly Goes the Night
Push the Sky Away
Ghosteen
She Fell Away
Girl in Amber
Scum
Knockin' On Joe
I Had A Dream, Joe
Lament
Song of Joy

Non-BAD SEEDS:
Dead Song
Cry
Dive Position
Just You and Me

Top LP was Prayers on Fire. (I misremembered earlier. Your Funeral...My Trial was #2.)

Thanks for running this, charlie rex!

Ballot

Tracks
1. Jubilee Street
2. Lovely Creature
3. Your Funeral My Trial
4. Lime Tree Arbour
5. We Call Upon the Author
6. Lay Me Low
7. TheLyre of Orpheus
8. SkeletonTree
9. Do You Love Me (Part 2)
10. Brompton Oratory
11. Loverman
12. (Are You) the One That I've Been Waiting For?
13. Death is Not the End
14. There Is a Town
15. Up Jumped the Devil
16. The Good Son
17. Tupelo
18. Jack the Ripper
19. Sun Forest
20. The Carny

Albums:
1. Let Love In
2. Skeleton Tree
3. The Boatman's Call
4. Murder Ballads
5. Ghosteen

btw 'tower of song' was robbed

I didn't vote for Tower of Song because it was a cover and we're gonna do a separate covers poll!!! Then Tower of Song can battle Avalanche

It’s really amazing that there’s only a 100 point spread between tracks 10-40. Just reviewing my ballot I can already see 5 or 6 tracks I could’ve easily swapped before submitting my ballot.

OTHER LOVED TRACKS:

41. Hiding All Away 108 points (5 votes)
42. I Had a Dream, Joe 106 points (5 votes)
43. Long Time Man 100 points (4 votes)
44. (Are You) the One That I’ve Been Waiting For? 99 points (4 votes)
45. The Carny 97 points (6 votes)
46. Slowly Goes the Night 93 points (4 votes)
47. Thirsty Dog 88 points (5 votes)
48. Scum 84 points (5 votes)
=49. Brompton Oratory 83 points (5 votes)
=49. Hard On for Love 83 points (5 votes)
=51. Lay Me Low 79 points (4 votes)
=51. Get Ready for Love 79 points (4 votes)
53. The Good Son 74 points (4 votes)
=54. I Need You 72 points (3 points)
=54. Knockin' On Joe 72 points (4 votes)
56. Push the Sky Away 71 points (4 votes)
=57. Train Long Suffering 64 points (3 votes)
=57. Skeleton Tree 64 points (3 votes)
=59. As I Sat Sadly By Her Side 62 points (3 votes)
=59. Lucy 62 points (4 votes)

No More Shall We Part really bombed.

strange because this is the one that really used to get played a lot at social gatherings in my university years. probably because it was released around that time.

mein ballot

i tried v hard to get Love Letter into the countdown, but alas to no avail lmao (mookie i got u)

i do kind of hate my ballot still

Tracks:

1 Love Letter
2. There She Goes My Beautiful World
3. Mermaids
4. Brother My Cup Is Empty
5. Nobody’s Baby Now
6. Little Janey’s Gone
7. From Her To Eternity
8. (I’ll Love You) Til The End of The World
9. Are You the One that I’ve Been Waiting For?
10. The Carny
11. Papa Won’t Leave You Henry
12. The Weeping Song
13. Tupelo
14. Deanna
15. Bring It On
16. Scum
17. Straight To You
18. Mercy Seat
19. Brompton Oratory
20. Red Right Hand

Nick Cave other projects etc Top 15 Tracks

1. Hamlet (Pow Pow Pow) – The Birthday Party
2. Brave Exhibitions – Boys Next Door
3. Wild World – The Birthday Party
4. After a Fashion -Boys Next Door
5. Release the Bats – The Birthday Party
6. Shivers – Boys Next Door
7. Nick the Stripper – The Birthday Party
8. Jennifer’s Veil – The Birthday Party
9. Somebody’s Watching – Boys Next Door
10. Mutiny in Heaven - The Birthday Party
11. Deep In The Woods - The Birthday Party
12. Junkyard – The Birthday Party
13. Happy Birthday – The Birthday Party
14. Nightwatchman - Boys Next Door
15. Friend Catcher - The Birthday Party

Top 5 Albums

1. Henry’s Dream
2. From Her to Eternity
3. Tender Prey
4. The Good Son
5. Boatman’s Call

No More was a huge gateway album for him, coming after the Boatman's radio hits (and Wild Roses) which opened his appeal to olds and normies. but if you stick around to dig deeper it's obv not as rewarding as literally anything else in his catalogue

The Minogue seat is waiting

A+ bendy

Thanks for running the poll Charlie! good fun.

are people interested in a voting/listening thread for the covers poll picking up fairly straightaway, or wait until after Christmas?

also an a+ thread title

Nice poll, great title! I briefly considered participating, as I was a big NC fan in the early-to-mid-90s, but I lost track over the years & now I can’t really even listen to him — just something about the melodrama & the theatricality that puts me right off.

Still, I have plenty of fond memories, obnoxiously busking The Mercy Seat & Deanna & Papa Won’t Leave You Henry & Jack the Ripper to bewildered downtown shoppers.

Live Seeds was always a favourite — my OPO — & that B-sides & rarities collection that came out in the early 2000s was a real treat. People give Stagger Lee a bit of shit, but I love how he took his lyrical cues less from previous musical versions than from an early jailhouse toast version (late 60s?) straight out of the oral tradition... and then mixed it up with a bunch of Cormac McCarthy slasher gore.

For The Birthday Party, I always really gravitated to “Happy Birthday.” It just makes me feel awful and glad all over — one of the great postpunk songs IMO.

Songs

Stranger Than Kindness
Tupelo
Jubilee Street
The Mercy Street
Idiot Prayer
Long Time Man
There She Goes, My Beautiful World
Babe, I'm On Fire
Saint Huck
Up Jumped the Devil
Papa Won't Leave You Henry
Say Goodbye to the Little Girl Tree
Do You Love Me
She Fell Away
Supernaturally
Magneto
Cabin Fever
We Call Upon the Author
Scum
Jack the Ripper

Other projects, all Birthday Party unless otherwise

Mutiny in Heaven
A Catholic Skin
Big Jesus Trashcan
The Friend Catcher
Junkyard
Mr Clarinet
Dive Position (BND)
Blast Off
Capers
Swampland
Release the Bats
Nick the Stripper
Dead Joe
Jennifer's Veil
Depth Charge Ethel (Grinderman)

Albums

Your Funeral My Trial
Tender Prey
Mutiny EP
Junkyard
Abattoir/Lyre

Enjoying seeing other peoples ballots, because even though I feel like I know the discography well there’s a few songs that have touched people that don’t ring a bell. Looking forwards to listening to those. I knew “Higgs Boson Blues” is a favorite, but I’m yet to connect with it.

I think “Love Letter” is a perfect song, but it’s so tied to the deep disappointment I felt with NMSWP, it fell off my ballot. I can replay every nuance of “Deanna” in my head, and “black and smoking Christmas trees” is one of his best interjections of imagery. Yet it’s so familiar, I couldn’t boost it past songs that I’m more invested in now.

Relistening, Dig Lazarus Dig rose in my esteem the most. The Good Son slipped the most compared to my memory.

I’m right there attitude wise with hardcore dilettante, I admire the work but can’t connect with it much any more. In recent years the elder statesman schtick and Warren / no Mick have put me off considerably. I can still listen to The Birthday Party all day long, I guess in my mind that’s equally Rowland’s and Tracy’s and Mick’s band.

i think we’ve been watching a more naked version of scott walker’s career.

great poll, charlie! here's my ballot:

TRACKS
Do You Love Me?
The Mercy Seat
There She Goes My Beautiful World
Stagger Lee
Higgs Boson Blues
O’Malley’s Bar
Tupelo
Saint Huck
As I Sat Sadly By Her Side
Lime Tree Arbour
Dig Lazarus Dig!!
Let The Bells Ring
Jubilee Street
Up Jumped The Devil
Oh My Lord
More News From Nowhere
Thirsty Dog
Hard On For Love
Mercy
Brother My Cup Is Empty

ALBUMS
Tender Prey
Abattoir Blues/The Lyre Of Orpheus
Let Love In
Dig Lazarus Dig
From Her To Eternity

In recent years the elder statesman schtick and Warren / no Mick have put me off considerably. I can still listen to The Birthday Party all day long, I guess in my mind that’s equally Rowland’s and Tracy’s and Mick’s band.

i relate to this a lot. i probably listen to rowland's music more than nick's, but nick singing "shivers" at the rowland s howard pop crimes show earlier this year in london (hard to believe it was in 2020) was very moving and felt that he was somehow acknowledging rowland's importance. of course mick was all over that show and i like to think if he had still been with us tracy would have been there too. the personalities that comprised the birthday party are quite incredible really and "cool" as cave might have been he was only ever the fourth coolest member imo.

Rowland didn't write a ton of songs, but everything he released was excellent. Teenage Stuff Film and Get Lost Don't Lie are tied with Your Funeral, My Trial in my book.

Always surprised at how low The Firstborn is Dead tends to gets ranked among Nick Cave albums, but 17th position in this poll is baffling. It's probably my favourite Bad Seeds record, along with Your Funeral... My Trial, after which Cave's albums get a bit patchy for me.

Firstborn is the album where he sticks to exploring the blues, and White Guy Explores the Blues isn't the most fascinating avenue of musical styling for the last twenty years. I got into Firstborn is Deadand Get Lost Don't Lie at the same time, and what entranced me about both the Bad Seeds and Immortal Souls was that both were exploring the blues in different ways, and both ways were unique to the history of white guys doin' the blues (at least up to that point.).

THERE IS A WAR COMING

Huh, whatever happened to Tom DiCillo?
He's still around NYC making art. I've run into him twice within the last 8 years, once at a screening of what was then a newly restored print of Howard Brookner's Burroughs: The Movie (DiCillo shot it), and another time at an art fair where he was exhibiting his work.

Theres currently a torrent war on the birthday party on dime just in case you;re interested like

Covers poll / listening thread is halfway through, if anyone missed it: TOWERS OF SONG: a Nick Cave Sings Covers listening thread and poll

CAVE COVERS as voted by a vast swathe of the ILM audience:

bubbling under

23. Patripassian
21 points, 2 votes
closing track of Current 93 album, 1996

21= What A Wonderful World
23 points, 2 votes
Nick Cave & Shane MacGowan single, 1992

21= She’s Not There
23 points, 2 votes
Neko Case & Nick Cave soundtrack contrib, 2011

and

20. All The Pretty Little Horses
23 points, 3 votes
title track of Current 93 album, 1996

lullaby
Current 93 with Nick Cave

19. The Hammer Song
25 points, 3 votes
Kicking Against The Pricks, 1986

The Sensational Alex Harvey Band
Bad Seeds

18. Long Time Man
26 points, 3 votes
…My Trial EP, 1986

Tim Rose
Bad Seeds, RFH 1999 (audience video)

love the Ling Time Man cover so much ... so eerie & cool sounding

*Long

Lingam Man

yay, glad my C93 votes made it

17. Helpless
27 points, 3 votes
tribute album The Bridge, 1989

Neil Young, Massey Hall 1971
Bad Seeds, KCRW 1989

ugh so great!

16. Disco 2000
27 points, 2 votes
B-side to Bad Cover Version by Pulp, 2002

Pulp video, 1996
Pulp reunion, 2011
Nick Cave
Nick Cave (Pub Rock Version)

15. Lost In Music
28 points, 2 votes
Dirty Sings EP by Anita Lane, 1988

Sister Sledge / Chic, 1979/84
Anita Lane with four Bad Seeds

14. Hey Joe
30 points, 2 votes
Kicking Against The Pricks, 1986

Billy Roberts demo, 1961
Tim Rose, 1969
Billy Roberts & Grits, 1975
Nick Cave, Mick Harvey, Toots Thielemans, Charlie Haden, David Sanborn, Hiram Bullock, Philippe Saisse and Omar Hakim, 1990

I didnt vote for Hey Joe but I love how creepy it is