I don't know how this one could have gotten past me, but I just discovered this song. I guess everyone else already knew this, but clearly one of the master works of the era, and the amazing cover by Cash will likely seal it as an all-time classic. I want to share some of my thoughts about this song, but I don’t have time to write this as well as I’d like. Please forgive its excessive length.
First, a note on the music. It's very unusual for a song from the rock tradition. No verse course arrangement, just a building repetition, interrupted early in the song by narration in the same voice. Clearly a product of its time, the studio version is produced as an “alternative” cut with a pretty typical post-punk sound. It’s almost like no one quite knew what to do with this song, including, one assumes, Cave himself. It takes a few listens for it to sink in that there is something much deeper going on here than the style initially suggests. In later, live versions, Cave seems to have come to grips with exactly what he has here and performs it in a more fitting way. That’s not to take anything away from the studio version. The kind of weird juxtaposition of substance and style make it something that you have to discover and lets you go deeper into the song with repeated listens. The work it takes to pick through the pop veneer makes you appreciate your discovery that much more.
The construction of the song has a great trick that is remarkably effective. The chord progression itself is wonderful, but it’s eight measures long, and seven of them build a tension that is only briefly resolved by the eighth before it immediately returns to uneasiness. It makes the whole song feel incredibly intense and unrelenting, which is analogues to the subject: a man on death row awaiting the electric char.
Which brings us to the lyric. There have been great song writers whose lyrics stand alone as poetic statement, but this has to be one of the best bits of poetry in its own right released on a rock record. It’s possible that I want it to be even better than it obviously is, but I read a little more into it than some. In the beginning monologue he proclaims his innocence, or at least sort of. “Of which I am nearly wholly innocent, you know”. Later he talks about his hands and fingers, one evil and one good, of which he observes “That filthy five! They did nothing to challenge or resist”. As if to proclaim his innocence, blaming the whole incident on these filthy five fingers. Tellingly, it is the “kill-hand” that “Wears a wedding band that's G.O.O.D.” He calls the ring “a long-suffering shackle collaring all that rebel blood”.
I read all of that to give an ambiguous meaning to guilt or innocence. A man, maybe not cut out of the same cloth as everyone else, doing his best to live as society dictates but finding himself unable to live up to the expectations. It’s a cognitive dissonance that eventually plays out in murder, but a murder this complex man does not blame himself for. This is a character that lives uncomfortably in a world not of his making. And as such, death can almost be welcome, a sentiment repeated throughout the song.
The middle verses about Jesus are the key to the whole thing, I think. He notes the irony that Christ was born and then, after making a life as a carpenter, he is crucified on a work of carpentry. He paints, quickly, a view of Jesus as another character who wasn’t able to live as others expected and ultimately met the same fate he himself awaits. He then goes on to further identify himself as a Christ figure by noting that He now sits on his heavenly throne, but down here it’s made of wood and wire, an obvious reference to the electric chair he will soon take his seat in.
But what to make of that last line: “But I’m afraid I told a lie.” I don’t think this is a confession of guilt. That’s already happened, really. We know he did it, and we know he did it for no reason anyone else could call “motive”. So what’s the lie? I think there’s a clue in the verse structure. The line comes in the same resolve measure that’s repeatedly told us “I’m not afraid to die”. A man who has lived his life with conflicting thoughts once again has to face the fact that what he’s told himself to be true may not be. As he climbs into what he’s convinced himself is the mercy seat, he realizes that he actually is afraid.
Weather he means it the way I hear it or not, it’s difficult to argue that this song is anything but brilliant. Clearly one of the best songs of the era, maybe one of the best rock songs ever. As an observation at the end of a review about a song that deals with death, I’d say this to Nick Cave. Walk through life confidant that, in a world of mortal men, you have made a mark that transcends mortality. A true masterpiece that will leave a strong legacy.
@fasteddie72 Right, the lie he told was he wasn’t afraid to die, but, that’s the torment of waiting to die, the same stuff runs thru your head over and over, thru appeals (ever had something you had to prepare for and just wanted it the fuck over with?), he probably once actually believed he wasn’t afraid to die but his own mind cannot help but torment him. His life has a firm end date. That’s fuckin heavy.
@fasteddie72 Right, the lie he told was he wasn’t afraid to die, but, that’s the torment of waiting to die, the same stuff runs thru your head over and over, thru appeals (ever had something you had to prepare for and just wanted it the fuck over with?), he probably once actually believed he wasn’t afraid to die but his own mind cannot help but torment him. His life has a firm end date. That’s fuckin heavy.
I don't know how this one could have gotten past me, but I just discovered this song. I guess everyone else already knew this, but clearly one of the master works of the era, and the amazing cover by Cash will likely seal it as an all-time classic. I want to share some of my thoughts about this song, but I don’t have time to write this as well as I’d like. Please forgive its excessive length.
First, a note on the music. It's very unusual for a song from the rock tradition. No verse course arrangement, just a building repetition, interrupted early in the song by narration in the same voice. Clearly a product of its time, the studio version is produced as an “alternative” cut with a pretty typical post-punk sound. It’s almost like no one quite knew what to do with this song, including, one assumes, Cave himself. It takes a few listens for it to sink in that there is something much deeper going on here than the style initially suggests. In later, live versions, Cave seems to have come to grips with exactly what he has here and performs it in a more fitting way. That’s not to take anything away from the studio version. The kind of weird juxtaposition of substance and style make it something that you have to discover and lets you go deeper into the song with repeated listens. The work it takes to pick through the pop veneer makes you appreciate your discovery that much more.
The construction of the song has a great trick that is remarkably effective. The chord progression itself is wonderful, but it’s eight measures long, and seven of them build a tension that is only briefly resolved by the eighth before it immediately returns to uneasiness. It makes the whole song feel incredibly intense and unrelenting, which is analogues to the subject: a man on death row awaiting the electric char.
Which brings us to the lyric. There have been great song writers whose lyrics stand alone as poetic statement, but this has to be one of the best bits of poetry in its own right released on a rock record. It’s possible that I want it to be even better than it obviously is, but I read a little more into it than some. In the beginning monologue he proclaims his innocence, or at least sort of. “Of which I am nearly wholly innocent, you know”. Later he talks about his hands and fingers, one evil and one good, of which he observes “That filthy five! They did nothing to challenge or resist”. As if to proclaim his innocence, blaming the whole incident on these filthy five fingers. Tellingly, it is the “kill-hand” that “Wears a wedding band that's G.O.O.D.” He calls the ring “a long-suffering shackle collaring all that rebel blood”.
I read all of that to give an ambiguous meaning to guilt or innocence. A man, maybe not cut out of the same cloth as everyone else, doing his best to live as society dictates but finding himself unable to live up to the expectations. It’s a cognitive dissonance that eventually plays out in murder, but a murder this complex man does not blame himself for. This is a character that lives uncomfortably in a world not of his making. And as such, death can almost be welcome, a sentiment repeated throughout the song.
The middle verses about Jesus are the key to the whole thing, I think. He notes the irony that Christ was born and then, after making a life as a carpenter, he is crucified on a work of carpentry. He paints, quickly, a view of Jesus as another character who wasn’t able to live as others expected and ultimately met the same fate he himself awaits. He then goes on to further identify himself as a Christ figure by noting that He now sits on his heavenly throne, but down here it’s made of wood and wire, an obvious reference to the electric chair he will soon take his seat in.
But what to make of that last line: “But I’m afraid I told a lie.” I don’t think this is a confession of guilt. That’s already happened, really. We know he did it, and we know he did it for no reason anyone else could call “motive”. So what’s the lie? I think there’s a clue in the verse structure. The line comes in the same resolve measure that’s repeatedly told us “I’m not afraid to die”. A man who has lived his life with conflicting thoughts once again has to face the fact that what he’s told himself to be true may not be. As he climbs into what he’s convinced himself is the mercy seat, he realizes that he actually is afraid.
Weather he means it the way I hear it or not, it’s difficult to argue that this song is anything but brilliant. Clearly one of the best songs of the era, maybe one of the best rock songs ever. As an observation at the end of a review about a song that deals with death, I’d say this to Nick Cave. Walk through life confidant that, in a world of mortal men, you have made a mark that transcends mortality. A true masterpiece that will leave a strong legacy.
@fasteddie72 The lie he told is that he is not afraid to die.
@fasteddie72 The lie he told is that he is not afraid to die.
@fasteddie72 Right, the lie he told was he wasn’t afraid to die, but, that’s the torment of waiting to die, the same stuff runs thru your head over and over, thru appeals (ever had something you had to prepare for and just wanted it the fuck over with?), he probably once actually believed he wasn’t afraid to die but his own mind cannot help but torment him. His life has a firm end date. That’s fuckin heavy.
@fasteddie72 Right, the lie he told was he wasn’t afraid to die, but, that’s the torment of waiting to die, the same stuff runs thru your head over and over, thru appeals (ever had something you had to prepare for and just wanted it the fuck over with?), he probably once actually believed he wasn’t afraid to die but his own mind cannot help but torment him. His life has a firm end date. That’s fuckin heavy.