Customer Reviews

Your Funeral My Trial

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Not Nick Cave's best overall album, but certainly a very good one indeed. The title track puts things in the right context, followed quickly by Stranger Than Kindness (a very rare non-cover cut that Cave didn't co-write.) Next up is The Carny, still one of Cave's most endearing songs. The pseudo-carnival music backing is the perfect backdrop for Cave's psychotic carnival-horror lyrics, that remind me a bit of books like Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes. Hard On For Love is... not a ballad, but, more accurately, a perverse confession of lust, made likable by Cave's over-the-top vocal performance. The highlight of the album however, most would argue, is Sad Waters. Perhaps Cave's first truly strong ballad, this is still considered one of his best songs to this day. A very strong cover of Tim Rose's Long Time Man is handled deftly by Cave and The Seeds, and it's lyrics of spousal murder coupled with their totally commanding performance will leave you finding it hard to believe that they didn't write the piece in the first place. For all intents and purposes, this is the last song on the album. Following it is Scum, a semi-hilarous non-song that will appeal to those who appreciate Cave's sense of humor. This set is, in many ways, the step between Cave's first handful of albums and what many consider to be his masterpiece, Tender Prey. Thus, it is an excellent album, and must be purchased for this reason.

There's so many good moments on this album, like the slow entrance of the snare drum on 'Long Time Man' and the lapse into chorus on 'Your Funeral... My Trial'. It's a dark, brooding piece of gothic poetry full of sex, violence, humour and most of all, love. It's no wonder Nick Cave inspires such admiration and loyalty in his fans - he's supremely talented and possibly the coolest person on the face of the earth.

This is one of his best releases, along with 'Let Love In'. Pick it up - it's a hard listen but it drills itself into your skull after a few listens.

Like some of the other reviewers on this page, this is not my favourite Cave album. On the first listen I didn't like it much, but since then I've found I keep on returning to it. It really does get under my skin. Its all very very dark, and the opening songs, 'Your Funeral...' and 'Stranger than Kindness' are brilliant, but horrible and twisted tales. 'Jack's Shadow' and 'Hard on for Love' are upbeat, but violent numbers. Then there's 'The Carny', the almost spoken word tale of a dead horse accompanied by fairground music from Hell! This album also contains what I think is Cave's first truly beautiful love song, 'Sad Waters'. The final "song" 'Scum' is a suitable ending to a dark angry album. This might also be Cave's most misogynist album. There seems to be a virgin and whore dynamic at work in Nick's attitude to women. It doesn't detract from the quality of the music, but its a word of warning to those of a feminist perssuasion. Definitely chilling, one I listen to when I'm in a unfriendly mood.

Some artists are good enough that to label one work as their best says more than a lot. Nick Cave is by all means one of them. And 'Your Funeral...My Trial' is that golden release. Beginning with the slow title cut, it moves it's way through track after track, sometimes menacing, sometimes violent, sometimes beautiful, and always thought provoking and dark. Highlights? Honestly, all of them. Warning, this album is Nick's least accesable and that says a lot too. But after a few good listens, it works it's way into your brain and it's the best thing since ever- I promise.

This is a flawless album from start to finish. Every single track is a five star affair, the insert and photos are fantastic.... there's nothing more to say. BUY THIS ALBUM if you even remotely like Nick Cave. You won't be disappointed.

From the first note of 'Your funeral my trial' you are swept into a land of nightmares, endless illusions, perpetual lust, and everlasting love. I will admit, this isn't my most favourite Cave album, but it is a good purchase. This probably doesn't rank with the best in my book because of it's everlonging 'meaness'. You listen to albums such as The Boatman's Call and even Murder Ballads and you receive a tender side of Cave. This album has only a few moments of 'warmth' in songs like 'Stranger than Kindness' and 'Sad Waters'(my personal favourite of Cave). Overall, this is a complete album. Full of Nick's usual antics of southern, bluesy, gothic, and country music. But, as the reviewer before said, this isn't as polished as he usual work. I will admit though, 'Jack's Shadow' is well worth the price of this cd. Probably one of the most under-rated Cave songs ever.

The slow dancing cheerfulness of the opening song is rather deceitful when you know that it is the title track of the album.
This is one of the very best Nick Cave albums of the early years. Together with "Tender prey" it marks the transformation from highly experimental albums like "From her to eternity" to the more mainstream blues / pop oriëntated album like "Let love in" and "Murder ballads"
The second song "Stranger than kindness" with it's mesmerising guitarplay, hypnotic percussion, odd backing sounds, and Cave's own monotone voice, is still one of my favorites and ranks among the best.
Another track, "The Carny", an original and rainy spoken word story, accompanied by a mouth-organ who seems the ocho from the far distance, became an instant-classic. During live gigs Cave is sitting on a stool and speaks in vein about the carnival and its strange artists (dog-boy, atlas, half-man, the geeks, the hired hands, some dwarfs and the carny who had a horse named Sorrow...)
Other songs like "Jacks shadow", "She fell away" and "Hard on for love" are powerful stuff, dark maybe, but with an energy drive that takes you by the hand and leads you safely through Cave's musical purgatory.
Is Cave guilty of overwelming us with sad and eerie lyrics? Is he guilty of grabbing is by the throat?
Yes he is, and on our knees we joyfully find him guilty.

My title may seem to suggest that this album is a dud, but in fact it's my favorite line from "The Carny". Nick Cave is an amazing writer and musician. He creates this atmosphere of decay, where love is a ghost that his gruff bassiness paints in shades of regret. I love this album. Stranger Than Kindness never ceases to give me chills. Sad Waters is a lovely tune of adoration and Scum is a nightmare right out of the darkest slums. The Carny never ceases to capture my attention. I can see EVERY SINGLE image that Cave describes in his tale, from the abandoned carriage to the dwarves burying the dead horse (aptly named Sorrow).

I hate having to explain my ratings, but for some reason I just can't give this 5 stars. For as great as Your Funeral, My Trial is, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have much better work out there.

Not recommended as a pick-me-up album. If you're in a lonesome mood and need some ballads of desperation, turn down the lights and stick this in. Cave will possess you, as he somehow does with many other examples of his work.

Though not as immediately accessible as later discs like Henry's Dream, Let Love In, and Murder Ballads, Your Funeral My Trial is one of the strongest Nick Cave albums, once you get used to it. It's less polished and less grandiose, and is even rather stark and minimal. Some of the songs are quite haunting and clever, without being as in-your-face and over-the-top as later material. Some of the lyrical phrasing is particularly awkward, but this is sort of endearing once you get past its initial clumsiness. Stranger Than Kindness is quite emotive, and the Carny is a classic. Scum is nerve-grating at first, but a classic once you've gotten used to the crooning vocals. Some tracks prattle on to somewhat unnecessary lengths, time-wise, but overall I consider this one of the best NC albums I've heard.

There is no Nick but Nick. While there are those who feel that Nick reached his apex with the first Bad Seeds album,"From Her to Eternity," the opening notes of "Your Funeral, My Trial" are without parallel in the whole of the Nick Cave catalog. In addition, this album contains the incomparable Blixa Bargeld uttering the immortal words: "The nag was dead meat; we can't afford to carry dead weight." on "The Carny." This line is guaranteed to put many a job review into perspective. And for full-out bitter invective, there's the bonus track "Scum" containing some of the nastiest, most alliterative insults that one is ever likely to hear. This album is Nick: tender, kind and gentle; nasty, bitter and sardonic.