As much as I love music, it's not that often that a show impresses me on such a profound, almost disconcerting level. I've just had a tremendously pleasurable weekend on all dimensions of the word, and it's largely thanks to the beautiful Saturday I had. For our anniversary, the very thoughtful, wonderful @godfish decided he'd surprise me with tickets to the Metronome Festival in Prague where, lo and behold, one very special person was singing.

Anyone who knows me knows how much I love Nick Cave, and more so since meeting Fish, so dare I say, it was a tremendous gift and experience. But before I get into the main act, I'd love to tell you a bit more about the rest of the day. Leading up to the day, I was worried that the announced storms would mess up our plans. Having already swam through the mud at Letnany once, I wasn't keen on the idea. Though amusingly, by the time Saturday rolled around, the 35C heatwave had us praying for rain. Still, we braved the sun and headed out in the midday scorcher to catch the opening act, KennyHoopla.

An interesting American indie rocker with a visible penchant for the 90s (which suited us great), the guy brought an interesting blend of "takes you back" nostalgia and fresh and appealing beats, so that it didn't just feel like we were listening to a 90s tribute band. What impressed us most about the guy, however, was the stage presence. I mean, it's a shitty position by all accounts to be the festival opener at midday in 35C, with several hours to go before the headliner. And while the crowd was small, KennyHoopla really got us working up a sweat, cheering and singing along (even though we'd never really heard him before then). He had a nice, slightly embarrassed laugh he gave, especially when he was being a little tongue-in-cheek, you know. But then again, who wouldn't be nervous in such a situation. WhatsApp Image 2026-06-22 at 10.53.04.jpeg

WhatsApp Image 2026-06-22 at 10.53.04.jpeg

After his set was over, we took a much-needed break from the sun and retired to a nearby brewery for lunch and some non-alcoholic refreshments. Tell you the truth, I could've easily bought a barrel of their hoppy homemade lemonade. This helped us withstand the worst of the heat, and we were back on festival grounds around 4ish to catch the next object of interest.

Slowdive was @godfish's pick as something worth checking out, and I must say, that man was not wrong. Later discovering that they've been around for some 37 years, perhaps it's a fault on our part not knowing them, but we definitely know them now. I can easily imagine them rocking up in the playlist. They had a groovy, shoegaze kinda sound that made you wanna close your eyes and rock back into nirvana. Okay, maybe the eye-closing was my caffeine crash, but I swiftly solved that and enjoyed the rest of the show. Alas, no pictures of these guys, since it was still quite sunny, so we hid in the shaded sitting area, which allowed us to better enjoy the music anyway, as it wasn't a dancey sort of act.

Afterwards came the Manic Street Preachers which, gotta say, were a big letdown. While neither of us were huge fans, we knew some of the songs and they're quite funky, no? And while the screen display was great, the band gave the impression of being bored and just going through the motions. A definite contrast with all the other acts of the day. We spent most of that cooling in the sprinklers before taking our spots by the main stage for Nick Cave. While the wait was hot and not that fun, it was well worth it, in the end.

*i'm stealing some of @godfish's pictures, with his kind permission, since his iPhone is whooping my Android's ass apparently.* It started as a wildly surreal experience. I found myself, like a child, thinking "he looks just like in the pictures", with this wide, goofy smile on my face. He kicked of the set with an extremely dynamic rendition of "Get Ready for Love". Energetic to the brink of violence, but then, isn't love, sometimes?

By "From Her to Eternity", I was still a little starstruck by how beautiful he seemed to me. There's something about the extremely consummate artist, and while I've seen many great gigs, few have been of Mr. Cave's caliber. It was clear from every movement, every micro-expression how much he cared, how much he was enjoying it, and how important the performance was to him (as I assume they all are). It was really quite moving. I loved "Train-Long Suffering" because in a way, it was the first song of the set that felt real to me. The intricate hopscotch between words, between rhymes, just such a delight to witness.

Both "Wild God" and "Carnage", he announced with the elegant, demure voice of officiating Sunday Service. *And now the congregation will play Carnage in E Minor.* Though come to think of it, the entire show had the quality of a religious ceremony, the sense of participating in ritual that our world is so hungry for, at the moment. The way the audience lived through every single song. The movements, the way he led the "congregation" into lifting their arms - not something dancy or performative, but something, dare one say, bordering on the divine. We need to be reaching more toward the divine. On that note, it was a tremendous pleasure to learn a few weeks before that Nick Cave is an admirer and reader of Martin Shaw, a thinker and storyteller I am obsessed with at the moment, whose thoughts go along much the same lines. I love these little synchronicities where all the things you love seem to connect. "O Children" broke everyone, as could be expected. Because it sounds like prayer and it sounds like love (which only the very best prayers do), so there was probably no dry eye in the house. "Tupelo" returned us by that murky, quarrelsome pirate's roadside that so many Cave songs inhabit. Even if it didn't rain, much to our and Mr. Cave's disappointment.

For me, the trinity of "Joy", "Rings of Saturn" and "Bright Horses" was something of unbearable beauty. > **We've all had too much sorrow, now is the time for joy** I thought how simple. Now is the time for joy. As though you could really just call it into being. And could you? A while back, I read Nick Cave talking about how grief presents you with two options - you either close yourself around your grief, and form a shell, closing yourself off to everyone, or you let it open you more to the world, to the village. It's not easy. I thought for a long time I was doing the latter, but I've been seeing gradually over the past year or so how that wasn't really true. How much I closed of myself for years, how I made of my own sorrow an altar. It came as a revelation during the show, and it really knocked me off my feet. The only time I can remember being so messed up during a concert was Alter Bridge, a few months after my grandmother died, and they played "In Loving Memory". Also in Prague. To quote Mr. Cave, fucking Prague.

But then... Then, "Henry Lee". Call it fucked up, but to me, Henry Lee is one of the best love songs ever written. Maybe it's just Cave's chemistry with the gorgeous PJ Harvey. The mixed signals between the song and the video. The way it suggests to me always that Henry wants to get down and join the darkness all along, but knows he really really shouldn't. I think Henry Lee is fighting, in that song, with everything he's got to be a good little boy. Like we all do, sometimes. > **For the girl you have, in that merry green land, Can wait forever for you to come home** Now how's that not a love song? Of course, there was no PJ Harvey on stage, but he did invite one of his tremendous back-up singers, whose name I forgot to write down and now can't find anywhere. But it sounds like a witch cursing you, which was pretty damn amazing: https://youtu.be/Uxj5iO8eN1Y "The Mercy Seat" and "Papa Won't Leave You, Henry" wove themselves like another cloak around us against the murky shadows. Sometimes, in the stories, you need several cloaks and nightshirts to keep you safe from harm. It's only the folly of youth to assume one will do.

"Red Right Hand", listening to it for the first time without thinking about Peaky Blinders. I'm sorry. It was a long show. I knew the song before, but it kinda overtook it, you know? It got me thinking about the lyrics, though, how they're really rather dark and ominous, how sexy they sound on Cillian Murphy. How sometimes we fetishize bad people and bad things. Nick Cave, a reminder always that the fetishizing is done best in stories and legends, but kept safely out of our private world. "Jubilee Street". I'm re-watching the music video while I write this. Get confronted by my own trickster feelings. The safety of Nick Cave (just as much there in the live show as in every single video I've watched since I was a kid. he's just got something, you know, that tells you despite all the pirate songs, he's a good guy at heart). The undeniable charm of Ray Winstone, feeling for his character when I shouldn't. The same problem as always, I guess. What a murky, suspicious, beatified song.

I loved the "Hiding All Away/White Elephant" moment, but not more than I did "Hollywood". The story of Kisa and the Buddha so present in the last few years in my life and my writing. It took me back to that feeling of a religious sermon. And you will feel grief, and you will be alright, still. It will bring you back to the village if you let it. I found it so hard to let it. It felt like being forgiven, this concert. Like being welcomed. But not inside a banquet hall. Inside a crossroads. I've seen the way grief can be greedy. The way it consumes all, if you let it. You can return to the village, but no one will force you. You can choose to live on the outskirts of that village, and make of your sorrow a wisdom and a strong, black tooth. Or you can disappear into the wilderness with it, and let it make a beast of you. Wild is not the same as feral, and when you don't know how to handle sorrow, it turns you feral, and masks you from your own soul's wilderness. Nick Cave reminded me of that.

*I think even the sky loved the performance.* It was a truly tremendous night. And what a performance. They played for two hours straight, took a 30 second break, then returned for another 25 minutes of encore. At almost 70 years old. That's fucking rock and roll. Speaking of rock and roll, I can't stress enough what a delight Warren Ellis is to witness. The look of a maniacal priest shouting his gospel, the devil playing his small brown violin as he leads you down into Hades. A true musical apotheosis. WhatsApp Image 2026-06-22 at 10.52.52.jpeg

WhatsApp Image 2026-06-22 at 10.52.52.jpeg

The encore gave us "The Weeping Song", and while it may seem quaint, reminded me how important it is, to have a place (or a song) in which you feel safe to weep. "Wide Lovely Eyes" and "Into My Arms", two prayers of love that felt like a dream come true. And not without notable gratitude. It's not nothing when a prayer is answered. WhatsApp Image 2025-11-01 at 07.59.11.jpeg

별내고 댄스부 Gleam / Bad Boy - 레드벨벳 커버 영상