Nick Cave Remembers Duet With Johnny Cash: “He Was My Hero”

Nick Cave’s new and eighteenth studio album with the Bad Seeds, “Wild God“, arriving five years after the release of “Ghosts” (read the review here). In view of the album’s release, the Australian singer-songwriter is busy with the promotion of the next album with his band, giving interviews that are never without interesting statements and food for thought.

To introduce “Wild God”, Nick Cave was recently Guest of Stephen Colbert on the American television program “Late Show” and was the protagonist of a chat focused not only on the album and on themes such as loss and change, but also – among other things – on his vision of music and of theartificial intelligenceas well as on its memories related to Johnny Cash.

“I believe that music is something that can make things better“, the “Red right hand” singer said at the beginning of the interview, answering a question about the power of music and what it means to him: “I really think it’s one of the last legitimate opportunities we have left to have a transcendental experience, but we have to be careful. I think there are now forces expressly designed to steal the creative act from usand I’m referring especially to artificial intelligence which is gaining more and more ground at the moment.”

In recent years Nick Cave has increasingly taken position against the use of artificial intelligence in musicclaiming in 2019 that she could never write a great song and reaffirming last year that songs are born from human suffering. In addition to reiterating his idea to Stephen Colbert, the Bad Seeds frontman shared his fears about the potential of AI applied to songs in a recent interview with “The Australian” magazine. Expressing his fears about the possible “humiliating effect” that artificial intelligence will have on the creative industries, Cave said: “Its intent is to completely elude the kind of inconvenience of the artistic experiencegoing directly to the merchandise, which reflects on us, on what we are, as human beings, that is, just things that consume things.

We’re not going to create stuff anymore, we’re just going to consume stuff. It’s scary.” He continued: “I’m a hugely optimistic person about the world in general, but I think the demoralizing effect or the humiliating effect that AI is going to have on us as a species is going to prevent us from pursuing artistic experience, to the point where we’re just going to accept what’s fed to us through these things.”

During his recent appearance on the “Late Show with Stephen Colbert”, Nick Cave also recalled his collaboration with Johnny Cash, with whom he recorded a duet cover of Hank Williams’ “I’m so lonesome I could cry” in 2002.

Recalling his meeting and experience with the “Man in Black”, who two years earlier had covered Cave’s “The Mercy Seat” for his album “American III: Solitary Man”, the Australian musician explained: “Just to be clear: Johnny Cash was my hero. I used to watch him on TV all the time as a kid, because in Australia they had the ‘Johnny Cash Show’ on, and I remember sitting there in front of the TV watching this man with such a voice. There was something in his voice that has stayed with me throughout my life.“. He added:

“To record together, I remember I got to the studio quite early and then when he got there – it was not too long after he passed away – I noticed he wasn’t doing great. When I saw him, he seemed like this sort of terrifying apparition of a very different man to who I thought he was. I remember him sitting down next to me and saying, ‘I’ve had a bit of flu, laryngitis, I have no voice. I’ve never asked Jesus for anything, but I was supposed to perform with you today, and last night I got down on my knees and prayed, ‘Jesus, I’ve got to sing with Nick. Give me my voice back.’ And then when he started singing he just transformed, he wasn’t the same suffering individual he had been before but something truly extraordinary. And it was literally right before my eyes.”

Preceded by three singles – the title track, “Frogs” and “Long dark night”, “Wild God” will be presented live by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds with a tour that will also stop in Italy for a single date set for October 20th at the Assago Forum.