Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!

Dig, Lazarus, Dig!! is too polished and preened to stagger down Cave's own self-made path of righteousness

Album Review by Billy Hamilton | 06 Mar 2008
Album title: Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
Artist: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Label: Mute

Loin-burning biblical narratives? Check. Riotous blues sludge? Check. Bandito-esque moustachios? Check. Yes, it's safe to say those ageing disciples of damnation Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds are back in town. Striding out from the throttling clutches of last year's brutal Grinderman side project, long-player number fourteen, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, finds Cave at his most lyrically rampant; brimming with those totem tales of bestial bed-hopping and nocturnal debauchery. Yet musically, tracks like the stomping We Call Upon The Author and Lie Down Here display more restraint than ever before, caught up in a groove-heavy blaze of hand-clapping rhythm that pays little heed to the skewered, affecting masterpieces of yore. Moments of brooding desolation still lurk in the twilight gloom of Jesus of The Moon and Hold On To Yourself's leering lament but, ultimately, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! is too polished and preened to stagger down Cave's own self-made path of rugged righteousness. [Billy Hamilton]

Read our review of the title track Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! By Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

Release Date: 3 Mar
Playing Glasgow Academy on 4 May http://www.nickcaveandthebadseeds.com