Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Your Funeral... My Trial (1986)

Possibly the least played of the early Bad Seeds albums and the only one not to chart in UK, it's easy to see why this album isn't a go-to when one fancies a dose of Nick Cave.

I bought this about 25 years ago, when in the depth of my Nick Cave obsession, determined to collect everything the band had done.

Perhaps its status as the forgotten album is underserved. Certainly, it's deep in 'the heroin years' and the darkness of the album makes it an uneasy listen, but there's certainly enough to make it worth persevering.

Title track Your Funeral My Trial, is a slow, languid opening with a time signature that takes me by surprise every listen, and it's followed by the dark Stranger Than Kindness. Jack's Shadow is a listenable cacophony, familiar from the previous two albums, without being the strongest, but then comes The Carny, the only stone cold Cave classic on the album, the fairground theme backing the tales of carny folk and their lives on the edge.

But the album takes a real dive after that high. She Fell Away ambles without impact, Hard On For Love has a thumping beat, Cave wailing away (think Tupelo, without the strength). Sad Waters is the closest to a gentle ballad, which ends up quiet and average, Long Time Man is a bluesy drawl, perhaps the strongest of the final section, before the album concludes with Scum, a rant over a lazy monotonic band riff.

It's not the band's high point, but shouldn't be discarded from the early Bad Seeds catalogue. It's both interesting as a snapshot of the early band, and worth it for a couple of really good songs.

Link to full album

3* - Worth its place in the back catalogue, even if it's not a Bad Seeds great.