Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds @ The Greek 06/24/17

[El Dingo]

I was a little wary of this show. Nick Cave's 15-year old son died 2 years ago in a climbing accident. His last two records have been slow, dark and cynical. How do you go on when your child dies?

The answer is (of course), you go on.

I have never seen an artist engage the audience the way Nick Cave did. His stage set included pieces that allowed him to step down from the stage into the crowd. For most of the songs he leaned over the front rows, allowing them to hold him up while he sang. Twice he climbed off the stage and wound his way into the center of the audience, mike in hand and singing flawlessly while being pawed by the adoring fans.

During the encore he brought at least 40 people on stage to dance and cavort about while he finished the set from a  piece of stage at the front of the band area.

Nick Cave is the closest thing we have to David Bowie and should be cherished.

Kudos to the Berkeley crowd for being participants in a show and helping Nick get back to the stage at the end of a song and generally being well-behaved fans.

For the record he did "The Mercy Seat", "The Weeping Song", "Push the Sky Away", "Stagger Lee" and most of his other 'hits'.