Nick Cave certainly is a man of extremes. After a startling return to the

splatter-happy violence typical of his previous band, The Birthday Party,

on his last album, Murder Ballads, Cave, driven by the twin demons

of a tattered love life and a commercial success (his duets with both

P.J. Harvey--who is subject of at least half of The Boatman's Call--

and with Kylie Minogue, were European hits) that unnerved him, Cave has done

a 180 and headed in the exact opposite direction this time, releasing an

uncommercial album of brooding, hymn-like tales of blighted romance.

The obvious stylistic reference point on The Boatman's Call is

Cave's personal idol, Leonard Cohen (he even uses a Casio, a Cohen

trademark of late, on one track, "Brompton Oratory"). Cohen has

steadfastly maintained his yoked themes of sex and spirituality through

the years, and it is this fusion which also permeates Cave's latest. In

general, since leaving behind his days of surrealistic Beefheartian

freewheeling with The Birthday Party, when he scribbled lyrics out with a

bloody needle and engaged in physical altercations with his "fans," Cave

has slowly moved from his former baroque excursions toward the more

circumscribed artlessness which has always been a trademark of Cohen's.

The Boatman's Call, then, is the album where Nick Cave finally

relinquishes all attempts at fictionalizing, telling us in simple,

unadorned language exactly what's on his mind. As such, it's only

partially successful, because while he may idolize Cohen, Cave doesn't

quite have the Canadian legend's knack for self-analysis, for lyrically

shredding himself to ribbons along with the female antagonists

often present in his songs.

Cave is generally comfortable with the ballad form, however, and

this album hearkens back to the generally restrained and stately

atmosphere of 1990's The Good Son. The album's first single, "Into

My Arms, " is a plaintive, emotional dirge that successfully hits the

Cohenesque nail on the head, melding its twin themes of love and

spirituality in an effortless manner: blackly humourous lines like "I

don't believe in an interventionist God / but I know, darling, that you

do" are certainly worthy of ol' L.C. himself. One problem that crops up,

however, is the relative musical sameness of some of the tracks:

The Bad Seeds, even given the additional presence of ace violinist Warren

Ellis of The Dirty Three, are reduced to the role of minimal accompanists

here, so the tunes where the Cave's lyrics don't rise above that of

standard balladic fare, such as "Lime-Tree Arbour" and the aforementioned

"Brompton Oratory," tend to slide by pleasantly enough, but without making

a memorable impact. One can only speculate as to what Bad Seed

multi-instrumentalist Mick Harvey thinks of all this.

Still, there are plenty of moments of inspiration here to remind us of

Cave's past greatness. "(Are You) The One That I've Been Waiting For?"

features our self-made crooner aping Scott Walker's delivery from

"Montague Terrace" ("O we will know, won't we?") and actually pulling it

off, while the bleak "Where Do We Go Now But Nowhere?," with Ellis's

spookily spectral violin in the background, paints a picture of Cave and

his ex-wife trapped in a meaningless universe, "going round and around to

nowhere." "West Country Girl" provides good gossip content, at least, as

we find that the song's implied subject, former Cave paramour P.J. Harvey,

has a thing for "Spanish fly . . . and monkey gland." Unfortunately,

"Black Hair," again about Harvey, overdoes the main image and finally

falls victim to lyrical cliches and an undistinguished backing track.

While Cave has progressed beyond his usual ploy of merely lyrically

killing off unfaithful or otherwise disappointing lovers, he still tends

to present a one-sided view of relationships: where Cohen uses the song as

a vehicle to by which to implode his ego, delving deep into the

psychic wreckage of his own life, Cave instead uses the song as a method

of ego-protection, falling back on the old ploy of blaming the

party in question for not living up to his romantic notions, as on "Far

From Me," where Harvey is depicted at "the first sign of trouble . . .

running back to mother." When, finally, Cave ends in self-pity, moaning

on "Green Eyes" that "This useless old fucker with his twinkling cunt /

doesn't care if he gets hurt," the effect is somehow less than

one imagines was intended, a comment that can also be made about The

Boatman's Call as a whole.