Nicholas Edward Cave is an Australian songwriter, vocalist, pianist, composer and actor, best known as a member of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.
He was born in Warracknabeal – a small town in Australian state of Victoria (22 September 1957). His music career started in 1973 (sixteen years old), when he met Mick Harvey (guitar), Phill Calvert (drums), John Cochivera (guitar), Brett Purcell (bass guitar) and Chris Coyne (saxophone). At first, they were playing covers of many artists such like Lou Reed, David Bowie, Alice Cooper, Roxy Music or Alex Harvey. In 1977 they started a post-punk band called The Boys Next Door. Year later Rowland S. Howard had joined them, before they changed their name to The Birthday Party in 1980. In the late 70s, The Boys Next Door were playing many concerts in Australia and they were a leader of Melbourn’s post-punk scene. Then, when they changed the band name, they started to play in London and West Berlin. During the shows, Cave was jumping, screaming and rolling on the stage. Their lyrics, such like “Nick The Stripper” or “King Ink” were parodies of an Old Testament, ones of these songs, where Cave used his famous, droll sense of humour. Unfortunately, The Birthday Party disbanded in 1983.
In the same year, Nick Cave and multi-instrumentalist Mick Harvey started a band with a lead guitarist Blixa Bargeld, bassist Barry Adamson and Jim G. Thirlwell. They call it like one of The Birthday Party’s EP – The Bad Seeds. The members were changing through the years, just like Cave’s music. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds has released seventeen studio albums with Nick Cave as a frontman and leader. The themes and music styles were coming different with each album. Even so, the main things, that Cave’s lyrics' talking about were: religion, death, love and violence. Critics Stephen Thomas Erlewine and Steve Huey:
With the Bad Seeds, Cave continued to explore his obsessions with religion, death, love, America, and violence with a bizarre, sometimes self-consciously eclectic hybrid of blues, gospel, rock, and arty post-punk