Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - There She Goes, My Beautiful World

The wintergreen, the juniper
The cornflower and the chicory
All the words you said to me
Still vibrating in the air
The elm, the ash and the linden tree
The dark and deep, enchanted sea
The trembling moon and the stars unfurled
There she goes, my beautiful world

There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes again

JohnWillmot penned his poetry
riddled with the pox
Nabakov wrote on index cards,
at a lectern, in his socks
St. John of the Cross did his best stuff
imprisoned in a box
And Johnny Thunders was half alive
when he wrote Chinese Rocks

Well, me, I’m lying here, with nothing in my ears
Me, I’m lying here, with nothing in my ears
Me, I’m lying here, for what seems years
I’m just lying on my bed with nothing in my head

Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me

There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes again

Karl Marx squeezed his carbuncles
while writing Das Kapital
And Gaugin, he buggered off, man,
and went all tropical
While Philip Larkin stuck it out
in a library in Hull
And Dylan Thomas died drunk in
St. Vincent’s hospital

I will kneel at your feet
I will lie at your door
I will rock you to sleep
I will roll on the floor
And I’ll ask for nothing
Nothing in this life
I’ll ask for nothing
Give me ever-lasting life

I just want to move the world
I just want to move the world
I just want to move the world
I just want to move

There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes again

So if you got a trumpet, get on your feet,
brother, and blow it
If you’ve got a field, that don’t yield,
well get up and hoe it
I look at you and you look at me a
nd
deep in our hearts know it
That you weren’t much of a muse,
but then I weren’t much of a poet

I will be your slave
I will peel you grapes
Up on your pedestal
With your ivory and apes
With your book of ideas
With your alchemy
O Come on
Send that stuff on down to me

Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me
Send that stuff on down to me
Send it all around the world

Cause here she comes, my beautiful girl
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes, my beautiful world
There she goes again

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - Shoot Me Down

Most sentimental nights

I'm in your sights

Shoot me down

There ain't no enemy here

You keep me very near

And shoot me down

Shoot me down

Your hands, they flutter up

Armed and dangerous

My buttercup

Shoot me down

In flames

Stand back, baby

Stand back and let me breathe

I think I'm fallin' out of here

I can hear the grass grow

I can hear the melting snow

I can feel your breath against my ear

I might just disappear

Wouldn't that be nice?

Yea, wouldn't that be nice?

Well, wouldn't that be nice?

I look into your eyes

Comes as no great surprise

You're gonna shoot me down

Shoot me down

I know that when you smile

It will only be just a short little while

Shoot me down

In flames

Shoot me down (shoot me down)

In flames (shoot me down)

Shoot me down (shoot me down)

In flames (shoot me down)

You're gonna shoot me down (shoot me down)

Oh in flames (shoot me down)

Shoot me down

Shoot me down

In flames

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Nature Boy

I was just a boy when I sat down
To watch the news on TV
I saw some ordinary slaughter
I saw some routine atrocity
My father said, don’t look away
You got to be strong, you got to be bold, now
He said, that in the end it is beauty
That is going to save the world, now

And she moves among the sparrows
And she floats upon the breeze
She moves among the flowers
She moves something deep inside of me

I was walking around the flower show like a leper
Coming down with some kind of nervous hysteria
When I saw you standing there, green eyes, black hair
Up against the pink and purple wisteria
You said, hey, nature boy, are you looking at me
With some unrighteous intention?

My knees went weak,
I couldn’t speak, I was having thoughts
That were not in my best interests to mention

And she moves among the flowers
And she floats upon the smoke
She moves among the shadows
She moves me with just one little look

You took me back to your place
And dressed me up in a deep sea diver’s suit
You played the patriot, you raised the flag
And I stood at full salute
Later on we smoked a pipe that struck me dumb
And made it impossible to speak
As you closed in, in slow motion,
Quoting Sappho, in the original Greek

She moves among the shadows
She floats upon the breeze
She moves among the candles
And we moved through the days
and through the years

Years passed by, we were walking by the sea
Half delirious
You smiled at me and said, Babe
I think this thing is getting kind of serious
You pointed at something and said
Have you ever seen such a beautiful thing?
It was then that I broke down
It was then that you lifted me up again

She moves among the sparrows
And she walks across the sea
She moves among the flowers
And she moves something deep inside of me

She moves among the sparrows
And she floats upon the breeze
She moves among the flowers
And she moves right up close to me

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - The Weeping Song

Go son, go down to the water

And see the women weeping there

Then go up into the mountains

The men, they are weeping too

Father, why are all the women weeping?

They are weeping for their men

Then why are all the men there weeping?

They are weeping back at them

This is a weeping song

A song in which to weep

While all the men and women sleep

This is a weeping song

But I won’t be weeping long

Father, why are all the children weeping?

They are merely crying son

O, are they merely crying, father?

Yes, true weeping is yet to come

This is a weeping song

A song in which to weep

While all the little children sleep

This is a weeping song

But I won’t be weeping long

O father, tell me, are you weeping?

Your face seems wet to touch

O then I’m so sorry, father

I never thought I hurt you so much

This is a weeping song

A song in which to weep

While we rock ourselves to sleep

This is a weeping song

But I won’t be weeping long

No, I won’t be weeping long

No, I won’t be weeping long

No, I won’t be weeping long

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Babe, You Turn Me On

Stay by me, stay by me
You are the one, my only true love

The butcher bird makes it’s noise
And asks you to agree
With it’s brutal nesting habits
And it’s pointless savagery
Now, the nightingale sings to you
And raises up the ante
I put one hand on your round ripe heart
And the other down your panties

Everything is falling, dear
Everything is wrong
It’s just history repeating itself
And babe, you turn me on

Like a light bulb
Like a song

You race naked through the wilderness
You torment the birds and the bees
You leapt into the abyss, but find
It only goes up to your knees
I move stealthily from tree to tree
I shadow you for hours
I make like I’m a little deer
Grazing on the flowers

Everything is collapsing, dear
All moral sense has gone
It’s just history repeating itself
And babe, you turn me on

Like an idea
Like an Atom bomb
We stand awed inside a clearing
We do not make a sound
The crimson snow falls all about
Carpeting the ground

Everything is falling, dear

All rhyme and reason gone
It’s just history repeating itself
And, babe, you turn me on

Like an idea
Like an Atom bomb

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Nobody's Baby Now

I’ve searched the holy books
Tried to unravel the mystery of Jesus Christ, the saviour
I’ve read the poets and the analysts
Searched through the books on human behaviour
I travelled the whole world around
For an answer that refused to be found
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby now

I loved her then and I guess I love her still
Hers is the face I see when a certain mood moves in
She lives in my blood and skin
Her wild feral stare, her dark hair
Her winter lips as cold as stone
Yeah, I was her man
But there are some things even love won’t allow
I held her hand but I don’t hold it now
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby now

This is her dress that I loved best
With the blue quilted violets across the breast
And these are my many letters
Torn to pieces by her long-fingered hand
I was her cruel-hearted man
And though I’ve tried to lay her ghost down
She’s moving through me, even now
I don’t know why and I don’t know how
But she’s nobody’s baby now

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - God Is In The House

We’ve laid the cables and the wires
We’ve split the wood and stoked the fires
We’ve lit our town so there is no
Place for crime to hide
Our little church is painted white
And in the safety of the night
We all go quiet as a mouse
For the word is out
God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
No cause for worry now
God is in the house

Moral sneaks in the White House
Computer geeks in the school house
Drug freaks in the crack house
We don’t have that stuff here
We have a tiny little Force
But we need them of course
For the kittens in the trees
And at night we are on our knees
As quiet as a mouse
For God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
And no one’s left in doubt
God is in the house

Homos roaming the streets in packs
Queer bashers with tyre-jacks
Lesbian counter-attacks
That stuff is for the big cities
Our town is very pretty
We have a pretty little square
We have a woman for a mayor
Our policy is firm but fair
Now that God is in the house
God is in the house
God is in the house
Any day now He’ll come out
God is in the house

Well-meaning little therapists
Goose-stepping twelve-stepping Tetotalitarianists
The tipsy, the reeling and the drop down pissed
We got no time for that stuff here
Zero crime and no fear
We’ve bred all our kittens white
So you can see them in the night
And at night we’re on our knees
As quiet as a mouse
Since the word got out
From the North down to the South
For no-one’s left in doubt
There’s no fear about
If we all hold hands and very quietly shout
Hallelujah
God is in the house
God is in the house
Oh I wish He would come out
God is in the house

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Stranger Than Kindness

Stranger than kindness
Bottled light from hotels
Spilling everything
Wet hand from the volcano
Sobers your skin
Stranger than kindness

You caress yourself
And grind my soft cold bones below
Your map of desire
Burned in your flesh
Even a fool can come
A strange lit stair
And find a rope hanging there
Stranger than kindness

Keys rain like heaven’s hair
There is no home there is no bread
We sit at the gate and scratch
The gaunt fruit of passion
Dies in the light
Stranger than kindness

Your sleeping hands journey
They loiter
Stranger than kindness
You hold me so carelessly close
Tell me I’m dirty
Stranger than kindness

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Push The Sky Away

I was riding, I was riding
The sun was rising up from the fields

I got a feeling I just can’t shake
I got a feeling that just won’t go away
You’ve gotta just keep on pushing
Push the sky away

And if your friends think that you should do it different
And if they think that you should do it the same
You’ve gotta just keep on pushing
Push the sky away

And if you feel you got everything you came for
If you got everything and you don’t want no more
You’ve gotta just keep on pushing
Push the sky away

And some people say it’s just rock and roll
Oh but it gets you right down to your soul
You’ve gotta just keep on pushing
Push the sky away

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - (Are You) The One That I've Been Waiting For?

I've felt you coming, girl, as you drew near
I knew you'd find me, 'cause I longed you here
Are you my destiny?
Is this how you'll appear?
Wrapped in a coat with tears in your eyes?
Well, take that coat, babe, and throw it on the floor
Are you the one that I've been waiting for?

As you've been moving surely toward me
My soul has comforted and assured me
That in time, my heart, it will reward me
And that all will be revealed
So I've sat and I've watched an ice-age thaw
Are you the one that I've been waiting for?

Out of sorrow entire worlds have been built
Out of longing great wonders have been willed
They're only little tears, darling, let them spill
And lay your head upon my shoulder
Outside my window, the world has gone to war
Are you the one that I've been waiting for?

Oh, we will know, won't we?
The stars will explode in the sky
Oh, but they don't, do they?
Stars have their moment and then they die

There's a man who spoke wonders, though I've never met him
He said: "He who seeks, finds, and who knocks, will be let in,"
I think of you in motion and just how close you are getting
And how every little thing anticipates you
All down my veins my heart-strings call
Are you the one that I've been waiting for?

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Higgs Boson Blues

Can't remember anything at all
Flame trees lined the street
Can't remember anything at all
But I'm driving my car down to Geneva

I've been sitting in my basement patio
It was hot

Up above the girls walk past
Their roses all in bloom
Have you ever heard about the Higgs Boson Blues?
I'm going down to Geneva baby
Gonna teach it to you

Who cares, who cares what the future brings?
Black road long and I drove and drove
Came upon a crossroad
The night was hot and black
I see Robert Johnson
With a ten dollar guitar
Strapped to his back
Looking for a tune

Ah, well here comes Lucifer with his canon law
And a hundred black babies running from his genocidal jaw
He got the real killer groove
Robert Johnson and the devil, man
Don't know who's gonna rip off who

Driving my car
Flame trees on fire
Sitting and singing
The Higgs Boson Blues
I'm tired, I'm looking for a spot to drop
All the clocks have stopped in Memphis now

And the Lorraine Motel is hot
It's hot, that's why they call it the hot spot
I take a room with a view
Hear a man preaching in a language that's completely new
Making the hot cots in the flop-house bleed
While the cleaning ladies sob into their mops
And the bellhop hops and bops
As a shot rings out
To a spiritual groove
Everybody bleeding
To the Higgs Boson Blues

And if I die tonight
Bury me in my favourite yellow patent leather shoes
And with a mummified cat
And a cone-like hat
That the Caliphate forced on the Jews
Can you feel my heart beat?
Can you feel my heart beat?

Hannah Montana does the African Savannah
As the simulated rainy season begins
She curses the queue at the zoo loos
And moves on to Amazonia
Cries with the dolphins
The Mai-Mai eat the pigmy, the pigmy eat the monkey
The monkey has a gift that he is sending back to you
Look! Here come the missionary
With his smallpox and flu
Saving them savages with his Higgs Boson Blues
I'm driving my car down to Geneva
I'm driving my car down to Geneva

Oh let the damn day break
Rainy days always make me sad
Miley Cyrus floats in a swimming pool in Taluca Lake
And you're the best girl I ever had
Can't remember anything at all

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Sad Waters

Down the road I look and there runs Mary
Hair of gold and lips like cherries
We go down to the river where the willows weep
Take a naked root for a lover’s seat
That rose out of the bitten soil
But bound to the ground by creeping ivy coils
O Mary you have seduced my soul
(And I don’t know right from wrong)
Forever a hostage of your child’s world

And then I ran my tin-cup heart along
The prison of her ribs
And with a toss of her curls
That little girl goes wading in
Rollin her dress up past her knee
Turning these waters into wine
Then she platted all the willow vines

Mary in the shallows laughing
Over where the carp dart
Spooked by the new shadows that she cast
Across these sad waters and across my heart

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Breathless

It's up in the morning and on the downs
Little white clouds like gambolling lambs
And I am breathless over you
And the red-breasted robin beats his wings
His throat it trembles when he sings
For he is helpless before you
The happy hooded bluebells bow
And bend their heads all a-down
Heavied by the early morning dew
At the whispering stream, at the bubbling brook
The fishes leap up to take a look
For they are breathless over you

Still your hands
And still your heart
For still your face comes shining through
And all the morning glows anew
Still your mind
Still your soul
For still, the fare of love is true
And I am breathless without you

The wind circles among the trees
And it bangs about the new-made leaves
For it is breathless without you
The fox chases the rabbit round
The rabbit hides beneath the ground
For he is defenceless without you
The sky of daytime dies away
And all the earthly things they stop to play
For we are all breathless without you
I listen to my juddering bones
The blood in my veins and the wind in my lungs
And I am breathless without you

Still your hands
And still your heart
For still your face comes shining through
And all the morning glows anew
Still your soul
Still your mind
Still, the fire of love is true
And I am breathless without you

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Brompton Oratory

Up those stone steps I climb
Hail this joyful day’s return
Into its great shadowed vault I go
Hail the Pentecostal morn

The reading is from Luke 24
Where Christ returns to his loved ones
I look at the stone apostles
Think that it’s alright for some

And I wish that I was made of stone
So that I would not have to see
A beauty impossible to define
A beauty impossible to believe

A beauty impossible to endure
The blood imparted in little sips
The smell of you still on my hands
As I bring the cup up to my lips

No God up in the sky
No devil beneath the sea
Could do the job that you did
Of bringing me to my knees

Outside I sit on the stone steps
With nothing much to do
Forlorn and exhausted, baby
By the absence of you

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Red Right Hand

Take a little walk to the edge of town
and go across the tracks
Where the viaduct looms,
like a bird of doom
As it shifts and cracks
Where secrets lie in the border fires,
in the humming wires
Hey man, you know
you're never coming back
Past the square, past the bridge,
past the mills, past the stacks
On a gathering storm comes
a tall handsome man
in a dusty black coat with
a red right hand

He'll wrap you in his arms,
tell you that you've been a good boy
He'll rekindle all the dreams
it took you a lifetime to destroy
He'll reach deep into the hole,
heal your shrinking soul,
but there won't be a single thing
that you can do
He's a god, he's a man,
he's a ghost, he's a guru
They're whispering his name
through this disappearing land
But hidden in his coat
is a red right hand

You don't have no money?
He'll get you some
You don't have no car?
He'll get you one
You don't have no self-respect,
you feel like an insect
Well don't you worry buddy,
'cause here he comes
Through the ghettos and the barrio
and the bowery and the slum
A shadow is cast wherever he stands
Stacks of green paper in his
red right hand

You'll see him in your nightmares,
you'll see him in your dreams
He'll appear out of nowhere but
he ain't what he seems
You'll see him in your head,
on the TV screen
And hey buddy, I'm warning
you to turn it off
He's a ghost, he's a god,
he's a man, he's a guru
You're one microscopic cog
in his catastrophic plan
Designed and directed by
his red right hand

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - The Ship Song

Come sail your ships around me
And burn your bridges down
We make a little history, baby
Every time you come around

Come loose your dogs upon me
And let your hair hang down
You are a little mystery to me
Every time you come around

We talk about it all night long
We define our moral ground
But when I crawl into your arms
Everything, it comes tumbling down

Come sail your ships around me
And burn your bridges down
We make a little history, baby
Every time you come around

Your face has fallen sad now
For you know the time is nigh
When I must remove your wings
And you, you must try to fly

Come sail your ships around me
And burn your bridges down
We make a little history, baby
Every time you come around

Come loose your dogs upon me
And let your hair hang down
You are a little mystery to me
Every time you come around

Come sail your ships around me (Come sail your ships around me)
And burn your bridges down (And burn your bridges down)
We make a little history, baby (We make a little history, baby)
Every time you come around (Every time you come around)

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - People Ain't No Good

People just ain't no good
I think that's welll understood
You can see it everywhere you look
People just ain't no good

We were married under cherry trees
Under blossom we made pour vows
All the blossoms come sailing down
Through the streets and through the playgrounds

The sun would stream on the sheets
Awoken by the morning bird
We'd buy the Sunday newspapers
And never read a single word

People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good

Seasons came, Seasons went
The winter stripped the blossoms bare
A different tree now lines the streets
Shaking its fists in the air
The winter slammed us like a fist
The windows rattling in the gales
To which she drew the curtains
Made out of her wedding veils

People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good at all

To our love send a dozen white lilies
To our love send a coffin of wood
To our love let aal the pink-eyed pigeons coo
That people they just ain't no good
To our love send back all the letters
To our love a valentine of blood
To our love let all the jilted lovers cry
That people they just ain't no good

It ain't that in their hearts they're bad
They can comfort you, some even try
They nurse you when you're ill of health
They bury you when you go and die
It ain't that in their hearts they're bad
They'd stick by you if they could
But that's just bullshit
People just ain't no good

People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good
People they ain't no good at all

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Jubilee street

On Jubilee Street there was a girl named Bee
She had a history but she had no past
When they shut her down the Russians moved in
Now I'm too scared, I'm too scared to even walk on past

She used to say all those good people down on Jubilee Street
They ought to practice what they preach
Yeah they ought to practice just what they preach
Those good people on Jubilee Street

And here I come up the hill, I'm pushing my wheel of love
I got love in my tummy and a tiny little pain
And a 10 ton catastrophe on a 60 pound chain
And I'm pushing my wheel of love up Jubilee Street
Ah, look at me now

The problem was she had a little black book
And my name was written on every page
Well a girl's got to make ends meet even down on Jubilee Street
I was out of place and time and over the hill and out of my mind
On Jubilee Street

I ought to practice what I preach
These days I go downtown in my tie and tails
I got a foetus on a leash

I am alone now
I am beyond recriminations
Curtains are shut
Furniture has gone
I'm transforming
I'm vibrating
I'm glowing
I'm flying
Look at me now
I'm flying
Look at me now

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Into My Arms

I don't believe in an interventionist God
But I know, darling, that you do
But if I did I would kneel down and ask Him
Not to intervene when it came to you
Not to touch a hair on your head
To leave you as you are
And if He felt He had to direct you
Then direct you into my arms

Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms

And I don't believe in the existence of angels
But looking at you I wonder if that's true
But if I did I would summon them together
And ask them to watch over you
To each burn a candle for you
To make bright and clear your path
And to walk, like Christ, in grace and love
And guide you into my arms

Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms

And I believe in Love
And I know that you do too
And I believe in some kind of path
That we can walk down, me and you
So keep your candlew burning
And make her journey bright and pure
That she will keep returning
Always and evermore

Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms, O Lord
Into my arms

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Do you love me?

I found her on a night of fire and noise
Wild bells rang in a wild sky
I knew from that moment on
I'll love her till the day that I died
And I kissed away a thousand tears
My lady of the Various Sorrows
Some begged, some borowed, some stolen
Some kept safe for tomorrow
On and endless night, silver star spangled
The bells from the chapel went jingle-jangle

Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Like I love you?

She was given to me to put things right
And I stacked all my accomplishments beside her
Still I seemed so obselete and small
I found God and all His devils inside her
In my bed she cast the blizzard out
A mock sun blazed upon her head
So completely filled with light she was
Her shadow fanged and hairy and mad
Our love-lines grew hopelessly tangled
And the bells from the chapel went jingle-jangle

Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me like I love you?

She had a heartful of love and devotion
She had a mindful of tyranny and terror
Well, I try, I do, I really try
But I just err, baby, I do, I error
So come find me, my darling one
I'm down to the grounds, the very dregs
Ah, here she comes, blocking the sun
Blood running down the inside of her legs
The moon in the sky is battered and mangled
Band the bells from the chapel go jingle-jangle

Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me like I love you?

All things move toward their end
I knew before I met her that I would lose her
I swear I made every effort to be good to her
I made every effort not to abuse her
Crazy bracelets on her wrists and her ankles
And the bells from the chapel go jingle-jangle

Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me? Do you love me?
Do you love me like I love you?