Ghosteen

In July 2015, during the recording sessions for Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' sixteenth studio album Skeleton Tree (2016), Nick Caves 15-year-old son Arthur died after falling from the Ovingdean Gap near Brighton, England. Skeleton Tree and the related documentary film One More Time with Feeling were released the following year; Skeleton Trees lyrical themes and its "bleak and disturbing" sound led to misconceptions that the album was entirely about Arthur's death. The majority of the songs on the album, however, were written prior to his death, with Cave only improvising and amending subsequent lyrics during the album's final sessions. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds returned to live performances in January 2017 and four months later released the compilation album Lovely Creatures: The Best of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (2017), which was originally due for release in 2015. In April 2018, Cave began a series of initially limited question-and-answer events called Conversations with Nick Cave, in which he explored the relationship with his audience; Cave's efforts in engaging directly with his fans continued in September 2018 when he began a blog, The Red Hand Files, with a similar concept where fans send in questions. In the same month, keyboardist Conway Savage—a member of the band since 1990—died of a brain tumor, which he had been diagnosed with a year earlier. Ghosteen was ultimately dedicated to Savage; however, Nick Cave discussed that the title of the album and lyrical imagery used is based on metaphysical conversations with Arthur. In the weeks after his death, the band released the extended play Distant Sky: Live in Copenhagen (2018) and premiered a full-length concert film of the same name. ==Recording==

in London, England (pictured in 2014), where Ghosteens orchestration was recorded Ghosteen was recorded in various locations in the United States, England and Germany between early 2018 and early 2019, with Nick Cave and Warren Ellis heading production. with a minimal setup of Cave on piano and Ellis on a Yamaha Reface DX synthesizer "sketch[ing] out pieces of music" together; the sessions lasted approximately a week. Ellis selected 20 tracks from the Retreat sessions to continue recording at Woodshed Recording Studios in Malibu and NightBird Recording Studios in West Hollywood, California in the US some months later. The Woodshed sessions—during which most of the album was recorded— Ghosteen was subsequently mixed by Cave, Ellis, Lance Powell and Andrew Dominik at Conway Recording Studios in Los Angeles, California and mastered by Chris Gehringer. ==Composition==

Ghosteen is a double album—Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' first since Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus (2004)—and contains 11 tracks. The first part of the album features eight songs, which Nick Cave describes as "the children"; the second part of the album contains two longer songs and a spoken-word track, which he describes as "their parents". In summarising Ghosteen, Cave referred to the album both as "a migrating spirit" and the final part of a trilogy of albums the band began with Push the Sky Away (2013), which also includes Skeleton Tree. when a series of images he visualised while in Oslo, Norway became the basis for a later verse in the song "Hollywood". According to Cave, "within this sudden vision the whole of the album presented itself". Several publications described Ghosteens lyrics as dealing with themes of loss, death, grief, and existentialism, but also noted positive themes such as empathy, faith and optimism. In addition to Cave's Christian imagery, the lyrics for the closing track "Hollywood" reference the story of Kisa Gotami, a Buddhist arhat who seeks help from the Buddha after the death of her child and discovers that "no one is untouched by loss." choral harmonies and drones. Orchestral strings are also a prominent feature of the album; Wydler had recorded drum tracks for several songs, but Cave felt "the drums anchored the songs to the ground and didn't allow them to float". Most of Wydler's tracks were subsequently removed from the final mix, a decision that Cave said was "not made lightly or on a whim, rather it was a tough artistic decision determined by the needs of the songs themselves." sings on several tracks in a falsetto vocal register, which has been noted for its "quavering, trembling" and "tremulous" quality. ==Packaging==

Ghosteens title is a combination of the word "ghost" and the Irish-language suffix "ín" (anglicised as "een"), which translates to English as "little", "small" or "benevolent". Cave took the title from a book about Irish tinkers, in which the author believes his crying child has been possessed by a ghost. However, the title has often been misinterpreted as a portmanteau of "ghost" and "teen". Ghosteens sleeve was designed by Cave and Hingston Studio, an independent creative agency based in London which had designed several previous Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' releases. The album's front cover art features an edited version of The Breath of Life, a 2001 painting by the artist Tom duBois from his Eden series. while The Observers Kitty Empire described the artwork as a "kitsch paradise" that signified "a radical change of emotional landscape" for the band. The album's inner sleeve features photographs of Cave and Warren Ellis shot by Matthew Thorne. ==Release==

Ghosteen was released on 4 October 2019 on streaming services and as a digital download on Ghosteen Ltd. Double CD and LP editions were released a month later on 8 November on Bad Seed Ltd; both Ghosteen and Bad Seed are the band's own imprints. The album was announced by Nick Cave in response to a fan question on The Red Hand Files, on 23 September. The title, track listing and brief descriptions of the album's songs were revealed; The lyrics to "Fireflies", Ghosteens penultimate track, had previously been published in the first-ever issue of The Red Hand Files a year prior. The film, which was later released as separate parts per song, features "a kaleidoscopic backdrop that shift[s] in colour and texture as the viewer passe[s] through the sequence – each vista making subtle reference to the theme behind the individual song." In support of Ghosteen, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds announced a 33-date European and UK tour, due to begin on 19 April 2020 in Lisbon, Portugal and conclude on 17 June in Tel Aviv, Israel. An 18-date North American tour, beginning on 16 September in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US and concluding on 17 October in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, was also later announced. A month prior to its commencement, it was announced that the European and UK tour was cancelled in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, with all shows rescheduled to later dates in 2021; three months later the North American tour was also cancelled. In lieu of the cancelled shows, Cave recorded a solo performance that June at Alexandra Palaces West Hall in London, which featured songs from Ghosteen. The full performance was streamed globally as a concert film, Idiot Prayer: Nick Cave Alone at Alexandra Palace, on 23 July. An extended version of the film, featuring four songs omitted from the original stream, was released in cinemas worldwide on 5 November, followed by double CD and LP, download and streaming releases on 22 November. Songs from Ghosteen were first performed by Cave and Ellis with singers and a string quartet in the documentary film This Much I Know to Be True, directed by Andrew Dominik and released in 2022. The documentary was filmed in spring 2021 before Cave and Ellis's UK tour. ==Reception==

Critical response Ghosteen received widespread acclaim from critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, it received an average score of 96, based on 28 reviews, making it the highest-scoring album of 2019. Writing for The Guardian, Alexis Petridis summarised that Ghosteen featured "the most beautiful songs [Cave] has ever recorded" and awarded it a full five-out-of-five-star rating. Petridis considered the album to be "an infinitely warmer, sweeter sibling" to Skeleton Tree, noting that "it continues and extends the weightless, drifting style of its two predecessors." The A.V. Clubs Marty Sartini Garner gave the album an A rating, praising its instrumentation, the otherworldly and spiritual quality of Cave's lyrics and its surprising accessibility. In a year-end essay for Slate, Ann Powers cited Ghosteen as one of her favorite albums from 2019 and proof that the format is not dead but rather undergoing a "metamorphosis". She added that concept albums had reemerged through the culturally relevant autobiographical narratives of artists such as Cave, who "offered a grand tour of his own haunted house of mourning four years after the accidental death of his son". Commercial performance Ghosteen placed in the top ten of several international album charts, including Australia, Italy, Ghosteen was the best-selling LP in the UK in its first week of physical release, with 15,135 copies sold. It previously sold 6,396 copies in the UK its first week of digital-only release. By the end of 2019, Ghosteen had sold 30,929 copies overall in the UK—with streams accounting for 12.5 per cent of sales—and was the twenty-sixth best-selling LP of the year. In January 2020 Ghosteen was certified Gold in Belgium, with 15,000 copies sold. ==Accolades==

At Metacritic, Ghosteen is the highest-rated album of 2019, the second highest-rated album of 2010s overall and the sixth highest-rated album of all time. It was ranked as the best album of 2019 by Far Out, Louder Than War, Mojo, musicOMH, The Observer, The Skinny and The Times. Ghosteen was further featured in the top ten of various publications' year-end lists, placing at number two in The Line of Best Fit, Treble and Uncut; number three in the Chicago Tribune, Slant Magazine and Under the Radar; number five in Q; number seven in The A.V. Club, BrooklynVegan, The Independent, PopMatters and Stereogum; number eight in GQ and The Guardian; and number ten by BBC 6 Music. In addition, Ghosteen was included in several publications' decade-end lists of best albums of the 2010s. The album was ranked at number 17 by The Independent, number 28 by Slant Magazine, number 50 by BrooklynVegan, number 65 by Treble, number 72 by Stereogum and number 87 by Rolling Stone. Ghosteen was nominated for Best Australian Album at the 2020 NME Awards, Best Independent Album at the 2020 Association of Independent Music (Aim) Independent Music Awards, Best Album at the 2020 Ivor Novello Awards, Best Independent Rock Album or EP at the 2020 Australian Independent Record Labels Association (Air) Awards and was shortlisted for the fifteenth annual Australian Music Prize. ==Track listing==

All personnel credits sourced from Ghosteens album notes. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds • Nick Cave – vocals, piano, synthesizer, backing vocals • Warren Ellis – synthesizer, loops, flute, violin, piano, backing vocals • Thomas Wydler – drums • Martyn Casey – bass • Jim Sclavunos – vibraphone, percussion • George Vjestica – guitar Additional performers • Augustin Viard – ondes Martenot • Kaushlesh "Garry" Purohit – tablas Orchestral performers • Ben Foster – string arrangement, conducting • Sam Thompson – string arrangement assistance • Tom Pigott-Smith – leading • Steve Morris – leading of seconds • Bruce White – first viola • Nick Cooper – first cello • Mary Scully – first double bass Technical personnel • Nick Cave – production, mixing • Warren Ellis – production, mixing • Lance Powell – recording, mixing • Kevin Paul – recording • Ben Thackeray – recording • Jake Jackson – recording • Alex Csak – recording assistance • Kaushlesh "Garry" Purohit – recording assistance • Richard Biethan – recording assistance • Ingo Krauss – recording assistance • Oliver Klemp – recording assistance • John Prestage – recording assistance • Andrew Dominik – mixing • John Armstrong – mixing assistance • Chris Gehringer – mastering, lacquer cutting Design personnel • Tom duBois – cover art • Matthew Thorne – photography • Nick Cave – sleeve design • Hingston Studio – sleeve design ==Charts==

Weekly charts Year-end charts ==Certifications==