Keep up at the back! I’ve explained all of this a dozen times by this point! For glorious entry into the prized and celebrated Necessary Evil Gold Star Artists Hall of Fame you need to meet just two basic yet extraordinary difficult criteria:
At least three albums
All albums featured on the Necessary Evil best of year countdown
Well… not none, but… few… Few Shall Pass.
NE25 saw two new entries to the most prestigious list in all of music. In all of life. And they’re biggies: legitimately two of the most notable artists of the 21st century, and even if a normie mainstream media (more like lamestream media, ammi right lads???) outlet like Rolling Stone or BBC or The Daily Stormer or Razzle decided to list the greatest artists of the past two decades they’d both be listed high. And, in a pleasing bit of symmetry, there were also two artists condemned to the eternal shame of being disqualified from the Gold Star Artists Hall of Fame and violently dispelled into the disgraceful Ex-Gold Star Graveyard. It was a great shame that one of these artists was expelled. The other one I couldn’t give less of a shit about.
And I’m talking about real grief here. Yeah, I know that you were really sad when the guy who played Joey on ‘Home Improvement’ died, or whatever, but that’s not the kind of grief I’m talking about. Actual grief isn’t just sadness. I got sad when Manchester United were knocked out of the Champions League by Real Madrid at the quarter final stage in 2000, but I don’t think you could accurately claim that I went through the grieving process. Yes, Redondo took us so thoroughly apart in that game that I am still suffering from post-traumatic shock, but that’s a separate thing. Real grief is far deeper than that. Your gran dying in 2003 was definitely a solemn moment, but she was 98 years old; hadn’t been able to take a shit since the late 1980’s; had three separate tracheostomies; still smoked 40 fags a day by sticking it one of the holes in her throat; and would angrily complain about you not letting her watch the latest episode of Minderlong after that show was canceled in 1994. Also, she was really racist. Like, a proper vintage racist who still used terms from the mid 20th century that everyone else has forgotten, so you never realised how hateful and bigoted she was being every time she called your friend Kai a “spam fritter”. Yeah, it was a bit of a bummer when Granny Edna died, and you definitely called it grief when you managed to fenangle three weeks off work, but, come on, you didn’t really give that much of shit.
Yeah, my subeditor Shawn picked that title, said it best encapsulated the feeling of the endless torment of duty that this list has become. “Shawn”, I replied, “You’ve done it again!”
Ah, fuck, am I including B-Side collections now?? I guess that shouldn’t be much of an issue, considering that there’s only a tiny, Jeremy Beadle handful of artists I would even considering purchasing a B-Side collection of. Just so you know, Manic Street Preachers‘ last B-Side collection was back in 2003. The Bad Seeds released ‘B-Sides and Rarities’ part one in 2005, so the Manics are already embarrassingly behind schedule. Sort it out, Wire. Although, to be honest, I was all ready to announce that the inherent importance of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have lead to them releasing the first B-Sides collection to be featured on Necessary Evil, until I remembered that Carly Rae Jepsen’s 2016 B-Side collection made #31 that year, so there really is no rhyme nor reason to it. Also, the featured image to that blog post is Al Pacino shoving cocaine into his face in Scarface, so let’s not pretend any of us has any idea what’s going on around here.
What a collection though, aye? Ammi right? Ammi right? I’m right. ‘B-Sides and Rarities’ part one was no slouch at all, containing a smattering of wonder that showed how harsh the band’s quality control had been during the first two decades of their existence considering the excellence of some of their cast-offs. It was clear that the bar to entry onto a Bad Seeds album was more stringent and difficult to pass than the best American colleges even if your mother used to be in Desperate Housewives. There were also other bits and bobs that settled debates such as whether Shane MacGowan did the best version of Lucy. He did. Debate over.
Hey, remember a few weeks ago when I basically just took far too long just to tell you that Nick Cave’s transcendent ‘Ghosteen‘ was the best album of 2019? Well, with that still fresh in your mind, I thought we should take the opportunity to kick back and…
Yeah, I’m in a good mood, what of it? Wanna fight about it? Bring it on, I bet I’ll have you kissing me before the first punch lands, because how can you stay angry at this face?? My good mood mainly arises from three reasons. Firstly, longtime reader Beryl got in touch to tell me how she enjoyed the last post, and only made the polite suggestion that this series could be improved if it…
…incorporated more hardcore scat pornography?? Jesus fucking Christ, Beryl. Honestly, whenever I’m that close to relaxing that restraining order, you come out with something that sends us back to square one. Maybe I’m at fault here for expecting more from someone I met on the online scatological fetish dating app ‘ScatrBraind‘, but I just always assumed she was interested in the person around the fecal matter, y’know?
Anyway, the second reason is that this will definitely be the final part in this series, allowing me to abandon my blog again to return to my three real loves (masturbating, crying, and masturbating while crying. Mainly the third, if I’m being completely honest). Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, we are now actually into the years where I made a point of listing the best albums, so this part should be an absolute piece of piss! Look at the header of this blog- I’ve already got my best albums of 07-19 listed! I just need to copy those albums down again for this entry! It’s 8:53 now, and I’ll have all this done and dusted in time for my traditional 9am cry! Let’s do this shit!!
OK, first off we all have to admit how ridiculous it is to rank The Bad Seeds’ albums, chiefly because of the fact that the form demands that certain albums need to be ranked toward the bottom of the list and be therefore deemed the band’s ‘worst’ albums or in some way ‘substandard’. Albums you or other weirdos like you might deem their favourites may well prop up the list and you may receive a jolting shock to your cultural sacks that you likely won’t recover from. The reason this list is likely to offend more than similar ones is because over the course of their nearly 30 years career The Bad Seeds have never released a bad album. I’d argue that they’ve never released even a subpar one. No, that one you’re thinking of? Get over yourself, that has brilliant moments and is number thirteen. The worst/least brilliant albums by The Bad Seeds would still be career highlights of lesser contemporaries like Pearl Jam or The Cure or The Beastie Boys. Just see this as 16 Bad Seeds albums ranked in order of their amazingness. If number 16 is your personal favourite, then your personal favourite is still an amazing album. Just be aware that ‘your personal favourite’ is subjective, while this list is official and objective. So it’s the 16th best. As long as you’re cool with that.
Perhaps my own personal perspective has to come into this. I first encountered Wavey Cavey and his Stinky Eggs as a precocious and hormonally operated thirteen year old with 1997’s The Boatman’s Call. This has probably meant that my entire idea of Nicholas and his Naughty Nuts has been through the frame of an achingly beautiful smack addict singing delicate odes to PJ Harvey (and probably, let’s face it, smack). If you’re disgustingly old enough to first come across The Bad Seeds when they first set sail in the 1980s- or even through Cave’s previous band The Birthday Party– then…
Well, then first of all you really are too old and decrepit to possess any worthwhile opinions. Your should be ashamed of your advancing years and retreat into functional alcoholism. I’m not explicitly saying that you should kill yourself, I’m just making sure that you’re aware that your death will have no real impact on the wider world and on a functional level you may as well kill yourself. OK? Good. Glad that we all understand.
Also, approaching The Bad Seeds from an ‘OG’ perspective may lead you to rate his earlier none more goth albums- the ones that are occasionally punctuated with distorted screams of “THE ORGAN GRINDER’S MONKEY FUCK’S THE VIRGIN MARY BLOODY CUNT WITH A RUSTY CRUCIFIX!”, and the like- a lot higher than I have. That’s cool. We’re all friends. But, scientifically, I’m correct and you’re wrong. And horrendously old. Seriously, what’s that smell? Oh. It’s you. That’s just what old people smell like. Ew.
This is probably the only reason i still do this stupid fucking list that nobody reads and the one post that I actually enjoy writing (because it’s basically just me making lots of pretty pictures), statistical motherfucking analysis!! The numbers, the records and the science, yo! behind Necessary Evil 2019. Let’s start with with what (spit) other music journalists thought.
Metacritic Scores
OK, we all actually agree on the nest album of the year, so the critics are actually correct for once. Chill out on Jamila Woods and Michael Kiwanuka though, yeah?
Necessary Evil 