mp3: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Red Right Hand
Let Love In, the 1996 album by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds will always be one of my all-time favourites. I placed it at #16 in the 60 albums@60 rundown a couple of years back, which was probably lower than I would have anticipated, but then again, many of the reasons as to why I have grown a bit less enamoured with Red Right Hand can be applied to why the album’s appeal has slightly diminished.
It dates from an era when Bad Seeds albums were greeted, in the main, by shrugs of indifference and accompanying tours were played in regular sized venues with tickets very much at the affordable end of the scale. I’ll repeat what I said two years ago – it’s not for me to say that the old days were the best, or that I begrudge the success that has come Nick Cave’s way in more recent times. But it all feels as if there’s a huge cash-in taking place, albeit there’s plenty out there willing to pay the big prices for tickets and to purchase all sorts of things direct from the man himself, such as a Red Hand charm (pictured above) with necklace for just £75.
The album is a masterpiece. Songs of menace, songs of mystery and songs of love over which Nick Cave delivers imaginative gothic poetry. An album of great beauty but also dotted with self-deprecating humour in many places. Red Right Hand has, from the outset, been its cornerstone. Played on most tours since the mid 90s, it was always met with rapturous applause.
And then came Peaky Blinders, the first-rate BBC TV show that ran from 2013-2022, and which had Red Right Hand (or extracts of it at least), as its theme tune. The use of the song, and other Bad Seeds material, made the public way more aware of the band than anyone could ever have contemplated.
The clock cannot be turned back. It is painful to accept that the nights at the Barrowlands and other similar types of venues will never be repeated, and as the blame for this, to some degree lies with Red Right Hand, then I have no issue by declaring that the songs means a lot less to me nowadays than it did almost thirty years ago.
I know it’s a twisted sort of logic. But that’s just the way I feel.
JC
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 
Agreed. It’s become his Losing My Religion, hasn’t it. The one that everyone knows but that long-term fans have become sick to death of. And like you, I don’t begrudge the belated uber-success he has been enjoying in recent years, but I’m also never going to pay stupid ticket prices to see him.
It’s like Super Furry Animals, who are touring next year. As much as I adore them, I refuse to pay over the odds to see them in soulless venues, especially as all tickets are being sold by Ticketmaster! Not that it has stopped shows selling out, mind.
I first saw the Bad Seeds at a STV studio recording thing they did several years ago (circa And No More Shall We Part era), and caught him again on last year’s Wild God tour at the Hydro.
Both were great, but for different reasons as they were very different, as I think you are alluding to above.