Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Ghosteen

Some records are doors, gateways into universes that you only know by hearsay or by having read something. If you have the right keys, you can open these doors to access the artist's world, their self, their heart, their soul. Some doors open to nothingness, while others open to flourishing sunlit gardens full of the most extraordinary creatures you've ever seen, almost like Edens. In these gardens, there is a hooded man with a large book in hand to which he is inevitably chained. The volume he holds is gray, imposing, written with characters that at first glance you can't read, but if you close your eyes, it's as if the words appear inside your eyelids.
The book speaks of the pain of losing a loved one: a child, a father, a mother, someone who perhaps gave their life for you, or for whom you gave everything. Beyond the pain, there is the processing of grief, a difficult path, different for each of us, that occurs in different stages and with different methodologies. You don't immediately realize what has happened, overwhelmed as you are by the moment, you realize it later, and you begin to work on yourself, to process what was there and now no longer is. The book is a journey from birth to growth, to death, and why not to reincarnation or resurrection, it speaks of relationships between people, of cutting ties or, on the contrary, of leaving open doors. How are you, are you a person who cuts all ties and only looks forward, or are you someone who always keeps an eye on the rearview mirror? Do you leave doors open, or do you never look back? The book speaks of this as well. It makes you wonder why certain things happen at a given time, it makes you ask if everything is interconnected or scattered on a table like buttons spilled from grandma's tin box. Is there a pattern linking your father's death to the much-desired new home to a new life, perhaps? The book presents these doubts to you, but doesn't demand an answer.
The book speaks of Dream who, shortly before his departure, talks to his sister Death and tells her how tired he is. But it also speaks of Dream who "consoles" his son Orpheus after Eurydice's death, it speaks of how to face grief, of what the "mortal way" is that he, Eternal, cannot understand but can still explain with simple, straightforward, hard, and true words.
It doesn't make much sense to talk only about music for Nick Cave's new work, "Ghosteen": if we analyzed it only in these terms, someone might call it monotonous, boring, a constant lament: but they would be absolutely wrong. Beyond rock, beyond blues, beyond murder ballads, beyond drone and electronics, the album is completely intangible like the cold of a sunny winter morning. It's there, you feel it, but you "feel" it differently, not through your ears but through your heart and emotions. As I was saying, it's like a door that Cave himself wanted to open, a purification journey that touches everything: the Bible and Christian religion, Buddhism, poetry, the unsettling and arid atmospheres of T.S. Eliot, and the hope filtering through Dante's songs of Paradise. It speaks of grief and the loss of a son, but it goes beyond that, it is processing and searching for something to move forward.
"Oh, this world is plain to see/It don't mean we can't believe in something/And anyway, my baby's coming back now on the next train/I can hear the whistle blowin', I can hear the mighty roar/(...)/Well, there are some things that are hard to explain/But my baby's coming home now on the 5:30 train" is the heartbreaking stance of a father who continues to believe in something, even though the loss has been enormous. And then again:
"Everybody's losing someone/It's a long way to find peace of mind, peace of mind
It's a long way to find peace of mind, peace of mind/And I'm just waiting now, for my time to come/And I'm just waiting now, for peace to come/For peace to come"
It's like in "American Beauty" when you see the bag floating, and you hear that "sometimes, there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it", and it's true, if you close your eyes, if you believe in something, if you think there is more, if you have people around you who trust you and live for you, you realize it is true. And you appreciate the sun, you feel at peace, you look for beauty in the small things that change your day.
The review for "Ghosteen" already present on this portal provides a technical reading, better than mine without a doubt, but it is necessary to go beyond all this, it is necessary now more than ever to read the lyrics, analyze them, "feel" the words and music on your skin. It's difficult, absolutely, probably many won't appreciate it, but if you manage to find the key and open the door, you will be amazed by what you hear.

"Please, take care of yourself. Seek out beautiful things, inspirations, connections and validating friends. Perhaps you could keep a journal and write stuff down. The written word can put to rest many imagined demons. Identify things that concern you in the world and make incremental efforts to remedy them. At all costs, try to cultivate a sense of humour. See things through that courageous heart of yours. Be merciful to yourself. Be kind to yourself. Be kind.
With love, Nick"