Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds

Heineken Music Hall
Amsterdam
The Netherlands

17th November 2013 (2013-11-17)


RECORDING:

Type: Audience master, recorded 8 metres back from the suspended left-hand
side PA stack.

Source: Factory-matched pair of Schoeps CCM 41V microphones (DINa mounted) ->
Marantz PMD661 recorder with Oade Concert Mod
(-18 dB gain/44.1 kHz/24 bit WAV)

Lineage: Audacity 2.0.5
* Amplified right channel by 0.5 dB.
* Applied variable envelope amplification across recording for
consistent listening experience.
* Attenuated audience noise.
* Added fades.
* Split tracks.
* Converted to 16 bit.
-> FLAC (compression level 8) [libFLAC 1.3.0 20130526]

Taper: Ian Macdonald (ianmacd)


SET LIST:

01. [04:30] We No Who U R
02. [07:11] Jubilee Street
03. [08:39] Tupelo
04. [05:43] Red Right Hand
05. [05:49] Mermaids
06. [05:39] The Weeping Song
07. [06:38] From Her To Eternity
08. [03:33] West Country Girl
09. [00:26] [banter]
10. [04:25] Sad Waters
11. [05:19] God Is In The House
12. [04:36] Wide Lovely Eyes
13. [10:15] Higgs Boson Blues
14. [05:28] The Mercy Seat
15. [11:13] Stagger Lee
16. [04:56] Push The Sky Away
17. [03:32] [encore break]
18. [03:45] Abattoir Eyes
19. [00:27] [banter]
20. [06:19] We Real Cool
21. [04:32] Do You Love Me?
22. [04:01] Into My Arms

Total running time: 117:06



NOTES:

And so we return to the Heineken Music Hall, where tonight we are fortunate
enough to be graced with the presence of Nick Cave a second time in as many
weeks.

This gig, originally Cave's only scheduled Dutch stop on this tour, sold out
in mere minutes, resulting in the addition of a second, chronologically
earlier gig, to the itinerary. That show, on 4th November, was an absolute
blinder, one of the concert highlights of my year, so it's fair to say that my
expectations this evening are high.

It turns out that I have purchased not one, but two tickets for the show. I
must have been intending to take Sarah, is all I can imagine.

Anyway, I had forgotten this detail and wasn't reminded of it until it came
time to print out my ticket and the PDF document turned out to have two pages.

Short on time, I have no choice but to sell one of the tickets outside the
venue, which I manage without incurring a loss, if you discount the fact that
the delay causes me to miss half the set of the first support act of the
evening, Les Colettes.

I am in time for the excellent Shilpa Ray, however, who performs tonight to a
crowd that includes more than its fair quota of ignorant, hostile arseholes. I
enjoy her generously sized support set, not just for the music, but for the
irritation that each successive song causes the turds around me.

And then it's time for Mr. Charisma himself.

Cave is one of those very rare artists who possesses both the temperament and
the versatility to indulge shouted requests from the audience. I doff my cap
to the man, not least because it makes for a somewhat unpredictable set that
rewards repeat attendance.

So many bands are happy to walk out on stage every night, sometimes months in
a row, and regurgitate a carbon copy of the previous night's performance,
right down to the stage banter and jokes. Ugh. Not so Cave. Every night is
opening night for this man. He works his arse off for the audience, which is
just as well, because at EUR 50 plus booking fee, the experience doesn't come
cheap.

It's something you ought to be able to take for granted, but Cave's heady
concoction of inspiration and perspiration is lamentably the exception, not
the rule. Cave is old school and purchasing a ticket from the family budget
still means something.

Seven songs from the first Amsterdam set make way for four replacements
tonight. As implied by this detail, the set punches out ten minutes shorter
than last time, juddering to a halt just before 23:00.

I manage to avoid the irritating roving beer drones this evening. More
accurately, they manage to avoid me. In fact, the occupational hazards that
plague gig-going music lovers everywhere in this godforsaken age of attention
deficit and self-worship are relatively low-key this evening. Much of the
credit for this is due Cave himself, of course. He has a stage presence that
commands one's attention.

The sound in the venue tonight is, once again, impeccable. Primed by the
experience two weeks ago, I can anticipate how loud it's going to get and know
exactly how to set the input levels.

The result is a very even recording that is every bit a match for the one I
made two weeks ago. I consider that recording to be amongst the very best I
have ever produced, a notion seemingly confirmed by the comments of those who
have downloaded and listened to it. That this one matches it for quality
pleases me immensely.

The two recordings complement each other beautifully and I leave it to the
listener to decide whether one is better than the other. As always, samples
are included in the comments to assist in deciding whether or not to download
this.

Performance-wise, again, it's a matter of opinion which of the two nights saw
the band closer to realising their full potential. As someone who was there on
both occasions, I really can't make any kind of distinction.

On the objective side, this performance is three songs shorter than the first
one.

If you haven't seen Nick Cave on this tour and he's passing by your way on the
remaining dates, you owe it to yourself to go and see him.