Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – More News from Nowhere

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  My Interpretation:A great interpretation bwenner I agree that the references to ‘The Odyssey’ are metaphorical and he is applying the metaphor to his life in the entertainment industry. I also agree that the song addresses his past relationships and the trail of destruction he has left behind.
  
  However, I think the song also deals with his life generally in the entertainment industry ‘the business’. He sings of seeing his friends in high places and how they have changed. They are all clones of each other and he doesn’t recognise them anymore; “I don’t know which is which or who is whom, they’ve all stolen each other’s faces”. Perhaps a reference to how fame inevitably changes people and makes them unrecognisable from who they once where: “Betty X is like Betty Y”, once again, there all the same. “It’s getting strange in here, It’s getting strange every year”. Increasingly he no longer recognises the world he inhabits.
  
  The entire song is littered with people who appear to be disillusioned. His decision to cast Peaches Geldof in the video is a reference to the darker side of fame. Pixie lost her mother to suicide because of fame and has lead (what appears to be), a confused existence, she doesn’t know who she is or what she wants.
  
  The other detail you won’t find in the lyrics, but is in the music video is that he is wearing a t shirt with St Kilda Beach printed on it. St Kilda Beech is a reference to Nick’s favourite part of Melbourne (his home town). He sings about ‘Don’t it make you want to get right on home’. I think this is a reference to Melbourne. He often speaks of his desire to come home, but being unable to because the press hound him too much, so he stays in England. I think the whole song is a reference to how he no longer recognises his life in ‘the business’ and longs to return home to where things make sense again.
  
  He no longer seeks out the excitement and distraction that the industry provides. He is done with it, he is happily married and wants to return home.
  
  …as you say though, interpretations are all subjective of course.

  Flag LYoungon June 25, 2012   Link

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  General Comment:"Wine-dark sea" is a formula (frequently repeated phrase) in Homer. When he says her hair is like the wine dark sea, he's directly quoting from The Odyssey.
  
  What I find interesting is the line "Don't it make you feel blue". The Ancient Greeks' definitions of colour were very different to ours, for instance Homer describes the sky as bronze and honey as green. As such, they effectively had no concept of "blue", either because of linguistic relativity or because our eyes have evolved to perceive more of the colour spectrum. As a literary guy, I feel like Nick Cave must have known this.
  
  Also, he could be referring to the band Betty X, though I have no idea what that has to do with The Odyssey.

  Flag PhylNotCharleson March 14, 2012   Link

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  General Comment:Definitely allusions to The Odyssey. Circes, Calypso, the Sirens, etc., but the protagonist mixes in his own stories of women. The Odyssey is an epic story of wanting to go back home... This is a man who has had several failed relationships and wants to go back to that one woman who he realizes he loved. (and don't it make you wanna get right back home)
  
  Unlike Odysseus, it seems he can't go back to her. I think this ties into the theme of DLD with people who are somehow sleeping or comatose and their struggle to find something romantic and heroic in the world or in themselves and wake up. The protagonist has gone through all of these life events with women, ending poorly for both him and them, but with the detailed descriptions of how he has somehow hurt or damaged them and left this trail of negativity behind him.
  
  The protagonist here has become disillusioned and sees that he only wants to "go home" to his own Penelope (read: Odysseus's wife), but he cannot or hasn't been able to because of his own blinding pride.
  The lack of self-awareness seems it ties into the idea of the helpless/hopelessness of not being "awake" and not being able to experience life completely. A sad tale of common destructive character flaws watered by the world we grow up in.
  "We are each our own devil and we make this world our hell." - Wilde
  
  To tie into the narratives of the trail of women that the protagonist leaves behind, in the music video, there are various portrayals of broken/disillusioned women within this sort of objectifying atmosphere. We are shown how the various women are in a post state of hurt in some way. The men are all intoxicated and the women are all putting on fronts, all the story same of his "adventures", while Cave is up on stage preaching his realization.
  
  Interpretations are all subjective of course.

  Flag bwenneron October 09, 2009   Link

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  My Interpretation:While Cave here does not follow the Odyssey anymore, I am pretty sure he still stays in the world of Greek myths and especially the fall of Troy. Elena probably means Helen of Troy, the cause of all that mess and the Trojan War in which Odysseus fought. Deanna could be Diana, which is the Roman name for the Greek goddess of nature and hunting, Artemis. She does not play a major role in the epic, but has a small role in Trojan War in the Iliad.

  Flag infinityontrialon December 18, 2008   Link

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  My Interpretation:While Cave here does not follow the Odyssey anymore, I am pretty sure he still stays in the world of Greek myths and especially the fall of Troy. Elena probably means Helen of Troy, the cause of all that mess and the Trojan War in which Odysseus fought. Deanna could be Diana, which is the Roman name for the Greek goddess of nature and hunting, Artemis. She does not play a major role in the epic, but has a small role in Trojan War in the Iliad.

  Flag infinityontrialon December 18, 2008   Link

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  General Comment:Appers66 did a great job explaining the song - it is the Odyssey. Here's my Random Useless Fact contribution.
  
  When Nick compares Polly to a siren, it's a double entendre because her biography is titled 'Siren Rising' (the first chapter of which is titled West Country Girl). And here's a link to a preview of the book:
  
  books.google.com/…
  
  
  

  Flag the_boatmanon November 30, 2008   Link

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  General Comment:Shawn Thomas Odyssey, who did Kung Fu Panda, also did the movie....get this.....The Cave. Coincidence?

  Flag bgsummer62on September 27, 2008   Link

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  General Comment:I got the Odyssey references, but it seems to go off-focus towards the end. Deanna doesn't fit the theme. And as for Elena & her panda blood...where does she come in? Great song, but probably should have been rewritten (& cut) a bit before being recorded.

  Flag morbid moragon May 04, 2008   Link

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  General Comment:yes, it references Odysseia, but what does it MEAN.
  
  to me that's only one part of the song anyway. There might a lot of references to a lot of works, I don't know, and maybe what he's trying to say is that everything he will do in life will be lost eventually, unlike Odysseia (and others?). "To think that everything you do today / Tomorrow is obsolete" is the most important line here.

  Flag pave12on April 02, 2008   Link

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  General Comment:Yeah, i picked it up after i realised the cyclopse refference and then it started to fall into place. They just keep comming. I realised the sheep thing before i came here. I figured id be one of the first. Appers66 did a better job of it than i could have. thanks. Great album to. Its scary. Im actualy studying the odyssey this year at uni.

  Flag veitchy_88on March 23, 2008   Link

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