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Nocturama
by Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds

Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 73 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
6.6 out of 10
based on 26 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 5 votes
Read user comments
Rate this album

Nick Cave & co. return for a follow up to 2001's 'No More Shall We Part.'

LABEL: Epitaph
RELEASE DATE: 11 February 2003
DISCS: 1 disc
GENRE(S): Alternative, Rock

NOTES: The limited edition CD includes a bonus DVD.


What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100
Alternative Press
This journey to Nocturama's not to be missed. [March 2003, p.88]
90
Launch.com
At first listen a morose rumination on the many shapes of love, the album slowly unfurls as a grand, almost gothic epic of vast proportion and luxurious significance.
Read Full Review
90
Splendid
This is one of Cave's best album in years, if not an immediate candidate for a career highlight.
Read Full Review
83
E! Online
Often funeral-march slow, but there are also flashes of passionate energy.
Read Full Review
80
Amazon.com
Nocturama feel[s] messy, unpredictable, and even a little dangerous--qualities Cave's music hasn't had in far too long.
Read Full Review
80
Blender
Piano ballads and muscular thrash that hearken back to his days with proto-goth ghoulfathers the Birthday Party. [#13, p.91]
80
New Musical Express
It's what The Velvet Underground would've sounded like if they'd been psychopaths. With a heart.
Read Full Review
80
Village Voice
Cave's molasses ballads take you to a warm spot where the big bad world's cynicism gets disabled and the numb parts thaw.
Read Full Review
80
Mojo
Cave has managed to move away from the stifling atmosphere and the false captive environment of No More Shall We Part and somehow create a Cave world where The Bad Seeds can indeed stretch, howl, riff, sniff, grind and bark with a freedom unheard on record since 1993's Live Seeds. [Album of the Month, Feb 2003, p.84]
80
Playlouder
As ever with the great man, this is a record that rewards the attentive, and repetitive listener.
Read Full Review
80
Junkmedia
Cave proves himself to be a continually fascinating and vital songwriter.
Read Full Review
74
Pitchfork
But with two (admittedly gigantic) exceptions, Nocturama reneges on its promise-- something's still missing from most of these tracks.
Read Full Review
70
Rolling Stone
Most people this pretentious or literary don't rock so hard or write tunes so good.
Read Full Review
70
CultureDose.net
Nocturama is as slight and as pretty as a walk through the snow on a sunny Winter day.
Read Full Review
70
Dot Music
At times, 'Nocturama' feels like he's trying too hard. Some of the ballads suffer this way, as if Cave's straining to recapture the gravitas of 'The Boatman's Call' without excessive revelations or dramatic contrivance.
Read Full Review
70
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Mostly in the quieter mode of his past few efforts, Nocturama presents songs of faith and devotion in the face of doubt, again demonstrating his newfound gift for understatement and the smoky croon.
Read Full Review
70
Uncut
This is his conscious attempt to inject a sense of urgency probably not heard on a Bad Seeds album since 1994's Let Love In. [Mar 2003, p.96]
68
Almost Cool
Another semi-spotty release.
Read Full Review
67
Austin Chronicle
The missing link between Murder Ballads and Boatman's Call.
Read Full Review
60
Neumu.net
Nick Cave, no mistake about it, is still a major talent, and Nocturama isn't nearly as bad a mid-career flop as Lou Reed's Mistrial or David Bowie's Never Let Me Down.... But nevertheless, this is also far from essential Nick Cave, as most longtime fans will immediately discern.
Read Full Review
60
Q Magazine
Trouble is, they're often only half-good songs. [Feb 2003, p.94]
58
Stylus Magazine
There is flatness where once there was majesty; there is garbage where once there was gold.
Read Full Review
50
PopMatters
Nocturama isn't an awful record, just a problematic one, mostly due to the fact that the spontaneous studio atmosphere under which he's trying to operate doesn't allow for the careful crafting that bore his prior masterpieces.
Read Full Review
50
All Music Guide
Everything is predictable and sounds like something Cave has done before. The Bad Seeds' edges are smoothed over by the too-slick production; Cave's lyrics are not provocative or funny or much of anything worth hearing.
Read Full Review
50
Delusions of Adequacy
Nocturama isn't the weakest album in Nick Cave's canon, but it's far from being a particularly good one either.
Read Full Review
40
The Wire
There's little to set the sombre half-tones of the Cave and Seed world alight with suspicous glimmers. [#228, p.59]

What Our Users Said

Vote Now! The average user rating for this album is 6.6 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Brendan D gave it a9:
It's taken me a long time to come to this conclusion, but Nick Cave is the greatest artist of all time. He did anger exactly right with The Birthday Party, a band that basically took "Lady Godiva's Operation" and turned it into a fucked-up party. When the Birthday Party exploded/imploded/blew up, the Bad Seeds picked up the slack, and they've been releasing classic album after classic album since 1984. Maybe the classic records have just made me a fanboy, but I honestly believe that Cave has done better since the mid-'90s than he did ever before. "Murder Ballads" is one of the best albums of all time, and "No More Shall We Part" is, far from the cringe-worthy schlock most old-school Birthday Party and early Bad Seeds fans want to call it, a beautiful, heartfelt, and darkly sinister record. "Nocturama" is not as good as either of these. It is, however, pretty damned good. "Babe I'm On Fire" isn't lame or cringe-worthy, and it's not fun. It's Cave's weird sense of humor that shine through, however, and you can never be 100% sure if he's sincere or not. I prefer to believe not, but it's hard and beautiful and dark all the same.

mads l gave it a2:
surely the worst cave album ever! even the rather dreadful "no more shall we part" somehow shines in comparison to this half-baked and bland album. The ridiculous finale of "Babe I'm om fire" is not the fun it was probably intended to be, it is just lame and cringeworthy.

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