NICK CAVE LOGS ON – P.S, I LOVE YOU

On February 19th something momentous happened, I woke up at 4am with purpose. No, really. I’m not lying. I had good cause. NICK FUCKING CAVE WAS TALKING TO FANS LIVE AND ON TWITTER… (I put this ellipse here so that you can have time to imagine me wetting myself with joy whilst making a sound somewhere between a scream of sheer excitement and what it might feel like to have gerbils shoved up your bum.)

I only saw the news the night before via the Facebook page and was prompt to hop into my jimmy jams and set the alarm; the results were far from disappointing.

Nick Cave has always been this kind of mystic figure in my life; the first time I ever heard a Cave song was during ‘He Died With A Falafel in his Hand’ where ‘Into My Arms’ was played during a ‘key scene moment’ (thanks IMDB).

I tried to create a mood to listen to the song in as an angsty teenager. Lying in my room on the floor at 11am with the blinds down wearing black. My dad came in and stood at the door, Beach Boys fan through and through, and erupted “I don’t know why the fuck you’d want to listen to this, sounds like you’re going to a funeral!” It was in that moment that I began my personal relationship with Mr Cave; and now here was my chance. My chance to ask him a question, the man who had synonymously brought together death and romance between himself and Australia’s out, loud and proud singing budgie Kylie Minogue. I was stoked.

So there I sat, in bed with my laptop rudely blearing me in the face (HIGH CONTRAST) expecting the usual 4:00am porn site to be pulled up, but instead I logged onto twitter and joined the masses of fans who set out to #asknickcave a question. Now, I wanted my question to reveal something about myself, my identity, who I really was as a person. I’m a gay Australian and I love dance music, but my heart is really for dark rock. I love fairness and equality but I’m subject to siding with the underdog… it just has that particular appeal. I love to go out and party, just really stick a whole bunch of razz up my nose, but when it comes down to it I love nothing more than to watch TV in bed and play with my silly little iPhone. I felt my question conveyed all these things, so I dared ask.

It had everything! The romance of ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’, the complexity of sisterhood, the gothicly charged age old story of triumph over failure (Kylie / Dannii), was proudly Australian but also tongue in cheek, aligning with the Pop culture wit we’ve come to adorn from Nick in his songs and novels; Truly a man who just loves to be in touch. Oh, and it had a ‘Neighbours’ throwback, my first true love.

I waited. And waited. And then I got up to wee and I came back to twitter and Nick still hadn’t written back to me. I was heartbroken. Shattered really. Imagine one of your grandmama’s porcelain cat figurines being pushed off the shelf by some careless brat. That’s how I felt. Watching all these other people have their questions validated while mine went unanswered. Tears were wept.

After closing my laptop and resting my head back on my pillow, before the seven stages of grief began my silly little iPhone flashed. There in the darkness my prayer had been answered:

I couldn’t believe it. I wanted to call, tweet, twat, twit, whatever! Nick Cave had finally answered my prayers and accepted me into the Bad Seeds fold and for that I could sleep easy. Nick Cave followed me!

While-ever Nick didn’t write back to my question, for those he did write back to he flexed his archaic wit and served those the traditional fire and brimstone.

Check it out below:

Words by Jack Colwell