A Christmas album for Nick Cave?

We’ve barely gotten rid of Christmas music before we’re already talking about next year’s music… You’re entitled to think so, of course, given the controversial fame this genre has. However, Nick Cave could also be added to the prestigious list of great artists who have recorded Christmas albums – Bob Dylan, James Taylor, Sheryl Crow… –. News to be taken with a grain of salt, even if it comes from Cave himself, in one of those Red Hand Files sessions in which he answers a barrage of questions from his audience with dry sentences and abundant use of irony. “When will your Christmas album be released?” asks Simon from Wokingham. “Maybe next Christmas,” Cave replies laconically.

For example, the tone is often this: “Anyone who pays even the slightest attention to my stuff will know that I’ve been in an Elvis in Vegas phase since the day I was born,” he responds to a reader who asks how much longer “this fat Elvis phase will last.”

But then he also says serious and interesting things: like that some songs from the tour left out of “Live God” could be released as a 7″. “There are already enough live versions of certain songs. We were more interested in telling an alternative universe of the studio album,” Jim Sclavunos told us when we asked him in our interview.

Nick Cave reveals that a return of bassist Martyn Casey to the Bad Seeds could be close: “He’s better, much better. Stay tuned!”.

In September 2024 Cave announced that the historic bassist of the band, in formation since the 90s, would take a break from touring and that Colin Greenwood, Radiohead’s bassist, who had already accompanied the Australian singer-songwriter on his solo tour and who is also present in Cave’s latest album “Wild God”, would arrive to replace him. Greenwood’s presence is also confirmed for the Australian tour which begins on January 17th and theoretically also for the next summer tour – which will go from First Summer to June.
According to what Sclavunos told us last December:

“He’s a very different musician from Martyn Casey, who is the longtime bassist of the Bad Seeds. They’re both incredible musicians, but I don’t want to define Colin too specifically. His language is different: Colin plays more elaborate and articulated bass lines, while Martyn has a lighter and more massive touch. One of the things that have defined the Bad Seeds is that each musician has a different background. I don’t want to speak for Colin, but I think it might be particularly interesting for him to be in the Bad Seeds because the only other band in he played was Radiohead.”