By now we'd imagine that most of you know that Nick Cave's teenage son died tragically in the summer of 2015. Cave & THE BAD SEEDS were about halfway through with this album when that occurred so the record is obviously engulfed by that tragedy. The songs are sparse & fractured & sound more like improvised sketches at times with poetic, almost spoken vocal performances. You probably won't be surprised to hear that album has a pretty dark vibe but many of the songs are truly beautiful & ultimately somewhat sad considering everything. Tragedy can sometimes breed creations of great beauty & that's certainly the case with "The Skeleton Tree." HIGHEST RECOMMENDATION POSSIBLE.

Nick Cave & BAD SEEDS/DIRTY THREE member Warren Ellis have scored a number of films over the past decade or so & this is their first proper album as a duo away from THE BAD SEEDS. Cave's lyrics are short story-like with spoken word passages at times with sparse arrangements & beats. This probably most similar to the recent "Ghosteen" & the other more subdued Cave album like "No More Shall We Part" & "Boatman's Call" but there's an experimental "looseness" that Ellis brings to the songs. RECOMMENDED OF COURSE.

FREAKY PSYCHEDELIC PUNK ROCK FROM LOGAN SQUARE.

Thick & rich analogue synths with darkwave & almost gothy tendencies. There's a pop element here too with some of this harking back to early 80's Factory Records stuff like SECTION 25, early NEW ORDER etc...Pretty good stuff. And in case you did not already know: COLD CAVE is the new project from former AMERICAN NIGHTMARE / GIVE UP THE GHOST / SOME GIRLS member, Wes Eisold. This CD includes the "Painted Nails" EP, "Electric Dreams" cassette & "From Coma Potion" LP.

A lot of buzz has been building about this PHILLY/NYC group because of their eps on What's Your Rupture & Hospital & now we finally get a full length release. COLD CAVE somehow manages to sound like early DEPECHE MODE & NEW ORDER while not really sounding retro at all. Perhaps it's their lo-fi approach to their music which puts them a little in the Sacred Bones/Captured Tracks territory (specifically BLANK DOGS) & their more experimental songs which are similar to THROBBING GRISTLE at times. Some of the songs are actually very accesible & remind us a little of YEAH YEAH YEAHS or even MAGNETIC FIELDS. This record has the potential to be REALLY HUGE & if you like minimal electronic pop & new wave then you NEED TO HEAR THIS! Reissued for the masses by Matador in November 2009.

Local sludge punk noise bass + drums duo..... debut vinyl LP w/ digital download.