1 The Bad Seeds rival The Beatles for rooftop gigs
At 11am, 8½hours before their scheduled show in Preston Park, Cave and the Bad Seeds squeeze onto Resident Records’ roof to serenade passing shoppers with “Train Long Suffering” from 1985’s The Firstborn Is Dead, starting a four-song set. The narrow street is quickly packed with an impromptu audience, including some here from across Europe for the official gig and amazed to find themselves extras in Cave’s version of Let It Be. “What a thing to be doing,” Cave marvels, before thanking “the best fucking record shop in the world”.
2 Nick Cave still loves Brighton
The whole weekend seems a celebratory, generous giving-back to Cave’s home for a quarter-century. He programmes his favourite Edwardian cinema the Duke Of York’s with five films which have informed his art, plus recorded intros. From Disney’s Pinocchio to ‘70s outback nightmare Wake In Fright to Pasolini’s The Gospel According To St Matthew, you can step deep into his world even without a gig ticket.
3 Jubilee Street’s location is officially confirmed
“Jubilee Street” is one Preston Park highlight. Cave confirms its title refers to the nondescript modern address mostly notable for Brighton’s main library, unrecognisably envisioned as a surreal, paranoid hellscape in his 2012 lyric. “This is a song about a girl,” he confides. “Actually, she lived and worked, and died, in Jubilee Street. Which is over there,” he gestures vaguely into town, “near the giant Five Guys hamburger joint they’ve erected, to immortalise this song…”
4 Home is where the heart is
Another Push The Sky Away song, “Wide Lovely Eyes”, is dedicated to Cave’s wife Suzie. “It’s about her,” he says. “It’s about Brighton,” before precisely locating their old home. “It’s about Brighton Beach. The Kemp Town end. Not part of the nudist beach, but a little bit to the left…”
5 Kylie Minogue knows how to sing a murder ballad
Kylie Minogue guests on “Where The Wild Roses Grow”. No one seems more amazed and delighted than Cave, who leaves most of the singing to his compatriot, in the role of the corpse whose head he bashes in. Cave hugs his friend hard, and she somehow keeps singing. “I want to express my unwavering, undying love for you, Nick Cave,” she exclaims.
6 Cave and Ellis’s double-act is defined
Warren Ellis doesn’t dominate as the Bad Seed who rivals Cave for charisma and bone-deep beneficence sometimes can, instead helping orchestrate the sound on violin, electric guitar and keyboard. Introducing the title song from their duo studio album Carnage, Cave helpfully defines their relationship. “This is from the short period of time when we were trying to be Simon and Garfunkel,” he explains. “I was Garfunkel. You were the musical one…”
7 The old songs still bite
Wild God no longer dominates the set as it did on Cave’s 2024 tour, and eldritch earlier songs complicate his benign recent image. “Tupelo” is drenched in blood and thunder even in the blue summer sky, and the singer seems trapped like Dylan in “Memphis Blues Again”, repeatedly realising: “Oh God, I’m in Tupelo…”
8 Some fans just can’t let go
Cave’s laying on of hands to front row supplicants is less pronounced than it has been over the last decade. When he does offer that genuinely healing touch, a strong male hand won’t let go. The tethered Cave keeps singing, then offers his free hand to another.
9 The Flaming Lips and the Bad Seeds are surprisingly simpatico
The Flaming Lips, whose death-redeeming anthem “Do You Realize??” firmly fits in Cave’s world, earlier led a supporting bill also including English Teacher, Cate Le Bon and Warmduscher. When a copy of the special new commemorative “Jubilee Street” single is later proffered to Cave, presumably for signing, he sees it differently. “You don’t like your Nick Cave record,” he sympathises. “We’ll get you a way better one. We’ll get you a Flaming Lips one…”
10 “Into Your Arms” is now a hymn
Finally, Cave sits alone gently stroking the piano for a solo “Into My Arms”. “If you could all sing along, that would be a beautiful thing,” he requests. This huge crowd murmurs the chorus with him, hushed for this secular and sacred hymn. It’s a final gift between Nick Cave and his former fellow citizens, a mutual benediction at the end of the night.