Lechuguilla Cave, New Mexico

A cave or cavern is a natural underground space large enough for a human to enter. The term applies to natural cavities some part of which is in total darkness. The word cave also refers to smaller spaces like rock shelters, sea caves, and grottos.

Speleology is the science of exploration and study of all aspects of caves and the environment which surrounds the caves. Exploring a cave for recreation or science may be called caving, potholing, or, in Canada and the United States, spelunking (see caving).

Types and formation[link]

The formation and development of caves is known as speleogenesis. Caves are formed by various geologic processes. These may involve a combination of chemical processes, erosion from water, tectonic forces, microorganisms, pressure, atmospheric influences, and even digging.

Most caves are formed in limestone by dissolution.

Speleothems in Hall of the Mountain King, Ogof Craig a Ffynnon, South Wales.

Solutional cave[link]

Solutional caves are the most frequently occurring caves and such caves form in rock that is soluble, such as limestone, but can also form in other rocks, including chalk, dolomite, marble, salt, and gypsum. Rock is dissolved by natural acid in groundwater that seeps through bedding-planes, faults, joints and so on. Over geological epochs cracks expand to become caves or cave systems.

The largest and most abundant solutional caves are located in limestone. Limestone dissolves under the action of rainwater and groundwater charged with H₂CO₃ (carbonic acid) and naturally occurring organic acids. The dissolution process produces a distinctive landform known as karst, characterized by sinkholes, and underground drainage. Limestone caves are often adorned with calcium carbonate formations produced through slow precipitation. These include flowstones, stalactites, stalagmites, helictites, soda straws and columns. These secondary mineral deposits in caves are called speleothems.

The portions of a solutional cave that are below the water table or the local level of the groundwater will be flooded.^[1]

The world's most spectacularly decorated cave is generally regarded to be Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico. Lechuguilla and nearby Carlsbad Cavern are now believed to be examples of another type of solutional cave. They were formed by H₂S (hydrogen sulfide) gas rising from below, where reservoirs of oil give off sulfurous fumes. This gas mixes with ground water and forms H₂SO₄ (sulfuric acid). The acid then dissolves the limestone from below, rather than from above, by acidic water percolating from the surface.

Primary cave[link]

Exploring a lava tube in Hawaii.

Some caves are formed at the same time as the surrounding rock. These are sometimes called primary caves.

Lava tubes are formed through volcanic activity and are the most common 'primary' caves. The lava flows downhill and the surface cools and solidifies. The hotter lava continues to flow under that crust, and if most of the liquid lava beneath the crust flows out, a hollow tube remains, thus forming a cavity. Examples of such caves can be found on the Canary Islands, Hawaii, and many other places. Kazumura Cave near Hilo is a remarkably long and deep lava tube; it is 65.6 km long (40.8 mi).

Lava caves include but are not limited to lava tubes. Other caves formed through volcanic activity include rift caves, lava mold caves, open vertical volcanic conduits, and inflationary caves.

Sea cave or littoral cave[link]

Sea caves are found along coasts around the world. A special case is littoral caves, which are formed by wave action in zones of weakness in sea cliffs. Often these weaknesses are faults, but they may also be dykes or bedding-plane contacts. Some wave-cut caves are now above sea level because of later uplift. Elsewhere, in places such as Thailand's Phang Nga Bay, solutional caves have been flooded by the sea and are now subject to littoral erosion. Sea caves are generally around 5 to 50 metres (16 to 160 ft) in length but may exceed 300 metres (980 ft).

Corrasional cave or erosional cave[link]

Corrasional or erosional caves are those that form entirely by erosion by flowing streams carrying rocks and other sediments. These can form in any type of rock, including hard rocks such as granite. Generally there must be some zone of weakness to guide the water, such as a fault or joint. A subtype of the erosional cave is the wind or aeolian cave, carved by wind-born sediments. Many caves formed initially by solutional processes often undergo a subsequent phase of erosional or vadose enlargement where active streams or rivers pass through them.

Glacier cave[link]

Glacier cave in Big Four Glacier, Big Four Mountain, Washington, ca. 1920

Glacier caves occur in ice and under glaciers and are formed by melting. They are also influenced by the very slow flow of the ice, which tends to close the caves again. (These are sometimes called ice caves, though this term is properly reserved for caves that contain year-round ice formations).

Fracture cave[link]

Fracture caves are formed when layers of more soluble minerals, such as gypsum, dissolve out from between layers of less soluble rock. These rocks fracture and collapse in blocks of stone.

Talus cave[link]

Talus caves are the openings between rocks that have fallen down into a pile, often at the bases of cliffs (called "talus").

Anchialine cave[link]

Anchialine caves are caves, usually coastal, containing a mixture of freshwater and saline water (usually sea water). They occur in many parts of the world, and often contain highly specialized and endemic fauna.

Physical patterns[link]

• Branchwork caves resemble surface dentritic stream patterns; they are made up of passages that join downstream as tributaries. Branchwork caves are the most common of cave patterns and are formed near sinkholes where groundwater recharge occurs. Each passage or branch is fed by a separate recharge source and converges into other higher order branches downstream.^[2]
• Angular Network caves form from intersecting fissures of carbonate rock that have had fractures widened by chemical erosion. These fractures form high, narrow, straight passages that persist in widespread closed loops.^[2]
• Anastomotic caves largely resemble surface braided streams with their passages separating and then meeting further down drainage. They usually form along one bed or structure, and only rarely cross into upper or lower beds.^[2]
• Spongework caves are formed as solution cavities are joined by mixing of chemically diverse water. The cavities form a pattern that is three-dimensional and random, resembling a sponge.^[2]
• Ramiform caves form as irregular large rooms, galleries, and passages. These randomized three-dimensional rooms form from a rising water table that erodes the carbonate rock with hydrogen-sulfide enriched water.^[2]
• Pit caves (vertical caves, potholes, or simply "pits") consist of a vertical shaft rather than a horizontal cave passage. They may or may not be associated with one of the above structural patterns.

Geographic distribution[link]

Caves are found throughout the world, but only a portion of them have been explored and documented by cavers. The distribution of documented cave systems is widely skewed toward countries where caving has been popular for many years (such as France, Italy, Australia, the UK, the United States, and so on.). As a result, explored caves are found widely in Europe, Asia, North America, and Oceania but are sparse in South America, Africa, and Antarctica. This is a great generalization, as large expanses of North America and Asia contain no documented caves, whereas areas such as the Madagascar dry deciduous forests and parts of Brazil contain many documented caves. As the world’s expanses of soluble bedrock are researched by cavers, the distribution of documented caves is likely to shift. For example, China, despite containing around half the world's exposed limestone - more than 1,000,000 square kilometres (390,000 sq mi) - has relatively few documented caves.

Records and superlatives[link]

• The cave system with the greatest total length of surveyed passage is Mammoth Cave (Kentucky, USA) at 628 kilometres (390 mi) in length. This record is unlikely to be surpassed in the near future, as the next most extensive known cave is Jewel Cave near Custer, South Dakota, at 242 kilometres (150 mi).^[3]

• The longest surveyed underwater cave is Sistema Sac Actun in Yucatán, Mexico at 215 km (134 mi).^[3] The record has been exchanged several times with Sistema Ox Bel Ha, currently at 182 kilometres (113 mi).

• The deepest known cave (measured from its highest entrance to its lowest point) is Voronya Cave (Abkhazia), with a depth of 2,191 metres (7,188 ft).^[4] This was the first cave to be explored to a depth of more than 2 kilometres (1.2 mi). (The first cave to be descended below 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) was the famous Gouffre Berger in France.) The Illyuzia-Mezhonnogo-Snezhnaya cave in Abkhazia, (1,753 metres or 5,751 feet) and the Lamprechtsofen Vogelschacht Weg Schacht in Austria (1,632 metres or 5,354 feet) are the current second- and third-deepest caves, respectively. The deepest cave record has changed several times in recent years.

• The deepest vertical shaft in a cave is 603 metres (1,978 ft) in Vrtoglavica Cave in Slovenia. The second deepest is Patkov Gušt at 553 metres (1,814 ft) in the Velebit mountain, Croatia.

• The largest room ever discovered is the Sarawak Chamber, in the Gunung Mulu National Park (Miri, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia), a sloping, boulder strewn chamber with an area of approximately 700 by 400 metres (2,297 by 1,312 ft) and a height of 80 metres (260 ft). The nearby Clearwater Cave System is believed to be the world's largest cave by volume, with a calculated volume of 30,347,540 m³.

• The largest passage ever discovered is in the Son Doong Cave in Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park in Quang Binh Province, Vietnam. Explored by joint Vietnamese-British cave scientists of the British Cave Research Association, it is 4.6 km (2.9 mi) in length, 80 m (260 ft) high and wide over most of its length, but over 140 m (460 ft) high and wide for part of its length.^[5]

World's five longest surveyed caves[link]

1. Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA^[3]
2. Jewel Cave, South Dakota, USA^[3]
3. Optymistychna Cave, Ukraine^[3]
4. Wind Cave, South Dakota, USA^[3]
5. Sistema Sac Actun, Mexico^[3]

Ecology[link]

Cave-inhabiting animals are often categorized as troglobites (cave-limited species), troglophiles (species that can live their entire lives in caves, but also occur in other environments), trogloxenes (species that use caves, but cannot complete their life cycle fully in caves) and accidentals (animals not in one of the previous categories). Some authors use separate terminology for aquatic forms (for example, stygobites, stygophiles, and stygoxenes).

Of these animals, the troglobites are perhaps the most unusual organisms. Troglobitic species often show a number of characteristics, termed troglomorphic, associated with their adaptation to subterranean life. These characteristics may include a loss of pigment (often resulting in a pale or white coloration), a loss of eyes (or at least of optical functionality), an elongation of appendages, and an enhancement of other senses (such as the ability to sense vibrations in water). Aquatic troglobites (or stygobites), such as the endangered Alabama cave shrimp, live in bodies of water found in caves and get nutrients from detritus washed into their caves and from the feces of bats and other cave inhabitants. Other aquatic troglobites include cave fish, the Olm, and cave salamanders such as the Texas Blind Salamander.

Cave insects such as Oligaphorura (formerly Archaphorura) schoetti are troglophiles, reaching 1.7 millimetres (0.067 in) in length. They have extensive distribution and have been studied fairly widely. Most specimens are female but a male specimen was collected from St Cuthberts Swallet in 1969.

Bats, such as the Gray bat and Mexican Free-tailed Bat, are trogloxenes and are often found in caves; they forage outside of the caves. Some species of cave crickets are classified as trogloxenes, because they roost in caves by day and forage above ground at night.

Because of the fragile nature of the cave ecosystem, and the fact that cave regions tend to be isolated from one another, caves harbor a number of endangered species, such as the Tooth cave spider, Liphistiidae Liphistius trapdoor spider, and the Gray bat.

Caves are visited by many surface-living animals, including humans. These are usually relatively short-lived incursions, due to the lack of light and sustenance.

Cave entrances often have typical florae. For instance, in the eastern temperate United States, cave entrances are most frequently (and often densely) populated by the bulblet fern, Cystopteris bulbifera.

Archaeological and cultural importance[link]

Throughout history, primitive peoples have made use of caves for shelter, burial, or as religious sites. Since items placed in caves are protected from the climate and scavenging animals, this means caves are an archaeological treasure house for learning about these people. Cave paintings are of particular interest. One example is the Great Cave of Niah, in Malaysia, which contains evidence of human habitation dating back 40,000 years.^[6] Another, the Diepkloof Rock Shelter in South Africa contains evidence of human habitation and use of symbols dating back 60,000 years.^[7]

Gallery[link]

• 

  Canyon passage in Mammoth Cave, the world's longest cave.

• Townsends in music hall.jpg

  Townsend's big-eared bats in a cave

• 

  Middle Age Livestock Shelter or Paridera in a Natural Cave in Piedra River, Aragon, Spain

• 

  Subterranean isle in Križna jama, Slovenia.

• 

  Karst cave with underground river exiting at Tolantongo, Mexico.

• Hastings Caves Tasmania.jpg

  Hastings caves, Tasmania, Australia.

See also[link]

• Cave Conservancies
• Cave Research Foundation
• Cenote
• Flowstone
• List of caves
• National Speleological Society
• Pit cave
• Speleology
• Speleothem
• Subterranean lake
• Subterranean river

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Caves

• Norwegian Cave Federation NO
• Australian Speleological Federation (ASF), AU
• British Caving Association (BCA), UK
• The Mulu Caves Project, A British-Malaysian collaboration to explore the caves of the Gunung Mulu National Park, Sarawak
• Classification of Caves A list of cave types with links to further information
• Journal of Cave and Karst Studies
• National Speleological Society (NSS), US
• International Union of Speleology (UIS).
• cave-biology.org Cave biology (biospeleology) in India.
• Biospeleology; The Biology of Caves, Karst, and Groundwater, by Texas Natural Science Center, The University of Texas at Austin and the Missouri Department of Conservation.
• French Caves List of Commercial Caves in France.
• Caves of Croatia List and details about longest and deepest caves and pits in Croatia.

Nick Cave
Nick Cave at an event in New York City, 2009
Background information
Born	(1957-09-22) 22 September 1957 (age 54) Warracknabeal, Victoria, Australia
Genres	Post-punk, gothic rock,[1][2] alternative rock, garage rock
Occupations	Singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, writer, actor, composer
Instruments	Guitar, piano, keyboards, vocals
Years active	1973–present
Labels	Mute
Associated acts	Boys Next Door, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Grinderman, The Birthday Party

Nicholas Edward "Nick" Cave (born 22 September 1957) is an Australian musician, songwriter, author, screenwriter, composer and occasional film actor.

He is best known for his work as a frontman of the critically acclaimed rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, established in 1983, a group known for its eclectic influences and musical styles. Before that, he had fronted the group The Birthday Party in the early 1980s, a band renowned for its highly gothic,^[1][2] challenging lyrics and violent sound influenced by free jazz, blues, and post-punk. In 2006, he formed the garage rock band Grinderman that released its debut the following year. Cave's music is generally characterised by emotional intensity, a wide variety of influences and lyrical obsessions with religion, death, love and violence.^[3]

Upon Cave's induction into the ARIA Hall of Fame, ARIA Awards committee chairman Ed St John said, “Nick Cave has enjoyed—and continues to enjoy—one of the most extraordinary careers in the annals of popular music. He is an Australian artist like Sidney Nolan is an Australian artist—beyond comparison, beyond genre, beyond dispute."^[4]

Youth, education and family[link]

Cave was born in the small town of Warracknabeal in the state of Victoria, Australia, to Dawn Cave (née Treadwell) and Colin Frank Cave. He has two brothers: Tim (b. 1952) and Peter (b. 1954), and a sister, Julie (b. 1959). As a child, he lived in Warracknabeal and then Wangaratta in rural Victoria. His father was an English teacher and administrator, with a love of literature, and his mother was a librarian. Cave's paternal grandfather's surname was originally Landvoigt, he later in his life became known as Frank Jason Cave.^[5][6][7][8]

Raised as an Anglican, Cave sang in the boys choir at Wangaratta Cathedral. He grew to detest the attitudes of small-town Australia, and he was often in trouble with the local school authorities,^[9] so his parents sent him to boarding school at Melbourne's Caulfield Grammar School in 1970. Cave joined the school choir under choirmaster Norman Kaye, and also benefited from having a piano in his home. The following year he became a "day boy" when his family moved to Murrumbeena, a suburb of Melbourne. Cave was 19 when his father was killed in a car accident; at the moment he was informed of this, his mother Dawn Cave was bailing him out of a St Kilda police station for a charge of burglary. Cave would later recall that his father "died at a point in my life when I was most confused", and "the loss of my father created in my life a vacuum, a space in which my words began to float and collect and find their purpose".^[10]

After his secondary schooling, Cave studied painting (Fine Art) at the Caulfield Institute of Technology (now Monash University, Caulfield campus) in 1976, but dropped out in 1977 to pursue music. He also began using heroin around this time.^{[citation needed]} On 28 March 2008, he received an honorary Doctor of Laws from this university.

Music career[link]

Early years and The Birthday Party (1973–83)[link]

In 1973, Cave met Mick Harvey (guitar), Phill Calvert (drums), John Cochivera (guitar), Brett Purcell (bass), and Chris Coyne (saxophone); fellow students at Caulfield Grammar. They founded a band with Cave as singer. Their repertoire consisted of proto-punk cover versions of songs by Lou Reed, David Bowie, Alice Cooper, Roxy Music and Alex Harvey, among others. Later, the line-up slimmed down to four members including Cave's friend Tracy Pew on bass. In 1977, after leaving school, they adopted the name The Boys Next Door and began playing predominantly original material. Guitarist and songwriter Rowland S. Howard joined the band in 1978, expanding to five members.

From 1977 until their dissolution in 1983 (by which time they were known as The Birthday Party) the band explored various styles. They were a part of Melbourne's post-punk music scene in the late 1970s, playing hundreds of live shows in Australia before changing their name to the Birthday Party in 1980 and moving to London, then West Berlin. Cave's Australian girlfriend and muse Anita Lane accompanied them to London. The band were notorious for their provocative live performances which featured Cave shrieking, bellowing and throwing himself about the stage, backed up by harsh pounding rock music laced with guitar feedback. Cave utilised old testament imagery with lyrics about sin, curses and damnation.^[1] The lyrics were full of "American gothic imagery", talking about horror stories.^[1] The single "Release the Bats" with its story about "vampire sex" was "influential" in the emerging "gothic scene".^[1][2] At that time, Cave also became a regular member of a gothic club in London called The Batcave.^[11]

After establishing a cult following in Europe and Australia, The Birthday Party disbanded in 1984. Howard and Cave found it difficult to continue working together and both were rather worn down from alcohol and drug use.

Cave and the Seeds (1984-present)[link]

Cave performing in 1986

The band with Cave as their leader and frontman has released fourteen studio albums. Their most recent album, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! was released on 8 April 2008. Though their sound tends to change considerably from one album to another, the one constant of the band is an unpolished blending of disparate genres, and song structures which provide a vehicle for Cave's virtuosic, frequently histrionic theatrics. NME used the sentence "gothic psycho-sexual apocalypse" to describe the "menace" present in the lyrics of the title track.^[12]

Critics Stephen Thomas Erlewine and Steve Huey write, "With the Bad Seeds, Cave continued to explore his obsessions with religion, death, love, America, and violence with a bizarre, sometimes self-consciously eclectic hybrid of blues, gospel, rock, and arty post-punk, although in a more subdued fashion than his work with the Birthday Party".^[3] Pitchfork Media calls the group one of rock's "most enduring, redoubtable" bands, with an accomplished discography.^[13] A documentary film about the band The Road to God Knows Where/Life at paradiso directed by Uli M Schueppel, about their 1989 tour, was voted in the year 2008, under the 20 best musicmovies of all the time of the reader and journalists of Total Film.

Cave and the band curated an edition of the famous All Tomorrow's Parties music festival, the first in Australia, throughout the country in January 2009.

Solo work and Grinderman[link]

In addition to his performances with Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Cave has, since the 1990s, performed live 'solo' tours with himself on piano/vocals, Warren Ellis on violin/accordion and various others on bass and drums. The current trio are Bad Seeds' Martyn P. Casey, Jim Sclavunos and Ellis (nicknamed the Mini-Seeds). In 2006, this line-up, now including Cave on electric guitar, continued his 'solo' tours performing Bad Seeds material.

In the same year three other Bad Seeds, Mick Harvey, Thomas Wydler and James Johnston, undertook Harvey's first 'solo' tours of Europe and Australia performing material from his own albums. Melbourne double bassist Rosie Westbrook completed the quartet.

An album of new material by Cave's 'solo' quartet, now named Grinderman, was released in March 2007.

Nick Cave 'solo' and Grinderman both played at the All Tomorrow's Parties music festival in April 2007. This was Grinderman's first public performance. Bobby Gillespie from Primal Scream accompanied Grinderman on backing vocals and percussion.

In December 2011, after performing at Meredith Music Festival, Cave announced that Grinderman were over.^{[14][dead link]}

Soundtrack involvement[link]

Many of Nick Cave's songs have found their way into movie soundtracks. One of the earliest to feature Cave's distinctive style by incorporating him as part of the movie's music scene—circa 1979—was Dogs in Space, a film by Richard Lowenstein.^[15] Cave performed parts of the Boys Next Door song "Shivers" twice during the film, once on video and once live.

Another early fan of Cave's was German director Wim Wenders, who lists Cave, along with Lou Reed and Portishead, as among his favorites.^[16] Two of Cave's songs were featured in his 1987 film Wings of Desire.^[17] Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds also make a cameo appearance in this film. Two more songs were included in Wenders' 1993 sequel Faraway, So Close!, including the title track. The soundtrack for Wenders' 1991 film Until the End of the World features Cave's "(I'll Love You) Till the End of the World." His most recent production, Palermo Shooting, also contains a Nick Cave song, as does his 2003 documentary The Soul of a Man.^[18]

Cave's songs have also appeared in a number of Hollywood blockbusters and major TV shows. For instance, his "There is a Light" appears on the 1995 soundtrack for Batman Forever, and "Red Right Hand" appeared in a number of films and TV shows, including The X-Files, Dumb & Dumber; Scream, its sequels Scream 2 and 3, and Hellboy (performed by Pete Yorn). In Scream 3, the song was given a reworking with Cave writing new lyrics and adding an orchestra to the arrangement of the track. This version appears on The Bad Seeds B-Sides and Rarities album. The song "People Ain't No Good" was featured in the animated movie Shrek 2, as well as in one of the episodes of the television series The L Word. Cave also sang a cover of The Beatles' "Let It Be," for the 2001 film I Am Sam.

Original material written for movie productions includes the song "To Be By Your Side," for the soundtrack of the 2001 French documentary Le Peuple Migrateur (called Winged Migration in the US). Cave composed the soundtrack for the 2005 film The Proposition with fellow Australian and Bad Seed Warren Ellis. Cave and Ellis once again collaborated on the music for the 2007 film The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Also in 2007, Cave and Ellis wrote the soundtrack for the feature documentary The English Surgeon. The duo also provided original music for The Road in 2009 and the soundtrack for the audiobook of Cave's novel The Death of Bunny Munro.^[19]

Most recently, his song "Up Jumped the Devil" was featured in the Remedy-developed 2010 video game Alan Wake.

Cave's song "O Children" was featured in the 2010 movie, though not in the official soundtrack, of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1.

Work with other artists[link]

Nick Cave has also played with Shane MacGowan, in a cover version of Bob Dylan's "Death is Not the End", and Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World". Cave has also performed "What a Wonderful World" live with The Flaming Lips. Cave recorded a cover version of the Pogues song "Rainy Night in Soho", written by MacGowan.

Nick Cave at a solo concert in Mainz, Germany on 11 November 2006.

MacGowan also sings a version of "Lucy", released on B-Sides and Rarities. On 3 May 2008, during the Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!! tour Shane MacGowan joined Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds on stage to perform "Lucy" at Dublin Castle in Ireland. Pulp's single "Bad Cover Version" includes on its B-side a cover version by Cave of that band's song "Disco 2000". On the Deluxe Edition of Pulp's Different Class another take of this cover can be found.

In 2000, one of Cave's heroes, Johnny Cash, covered Cave's "The Mercy Seat" on the album American III: Solitary Man, seemingly repaying Cave for the compliment he paid by covering Cash's "The Singer" (originally "The Folk Singer") on his Kicking Against the Pricks album. Cave was then invited to be one of many rock and country artists to contribute to the liner notes of the retrospective The Essential Johnny Cash CD, released to coincide with Cash's 70th birthday. Subsequently, Cave cut a duet with Cash on a version of Hank Williams' "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" for Cash's American IV: The Man Comes Around album (2002). A similar duet, the American folk song "Cindy", was released posthumously on the "Johnny Cash: Unearthed" boxset. Cave's song "Let the Bells Ring" is a posthumous tribute to Cash. Cave has also covered the song "Wanted Man" which is best known as performed by Johnny Cash but is a Bob Dylan composition.

In 2004, Cave gave a hand to Marianne Faithfull on the album, Before the Poison. He co-wrote and produced three songs ("Crazy Love", "There is a Ghost" and "Desperanto"), and the Bad Seeds are featured on all of them. He is also featured on "The Crane Wife" (originally by The Decemberists), on Faithfull's 2008 album, Easy Come, Easy Go.

Cave collaborated with the band Current 93 on their album All the Pretty Little Horses, where he sings the title track, a lullaby. For his 1996 album Murder Ballads, Cave recorded "Where The Wild Roses Grow" with Kylie Minogue, and "Henry Lee" with P.J. Harvey.

Cave also took part in the "X-Files" compilation CD with some other artists, where he reads parts from the Bible combined with own texts, like "Time Jesum...", he outed himself as a fan of the series some years ago, but since he does not watch much TV, it was one of the only things he watched. He collaborated on the 2003 single "Bring It On", with Chris Bailey, formerly of the Australian punk group, The Saints. Cave contributed vocals to the song "Sweet Rosyanne", on the 2006 album Catch That Train! from Dan Zanes & Friends, a children's music group.

In 2011, Cave recorded a cover of the Zombies' "She's Not There" with Neko Case, which was used at the end of the first episode of the fourth season of True Blood.

Literary career[link]

Cave released his first book, King Ink, in 1988. It is a collection of lyrics and plays, including collaborations with Lydia Lunch. In 1997, he followed up with King Ink II, containing lyrics, poems, and the transcript of a radio essay he did for the BBC in July 1996, "The Flesh Made Word," discussing in biographical format his relationship with Christianity.

Cave reading from The Death of Bunny Munro in New York City, 2009.

While he was based in West Berlin, Cave started working on what was to become his debut novel, And the Ass Saw the Angel (1989). Significant crossover is evident between the themes in the book and the lyrics Cave wrote in the late stages of the Birthday Party and the early stage of his solo career. "Swampland", from Mutiny, in particular, uses the same linguistic stylings ('mah' for 'my', for instance) and some of the same themes (the narrator being haunted by the memory of a girl called Lucy, being hunted like an animal, approaching death and execution). On 21 January 2008, a special edition of Cave's novel And the Ass Saw the Angel was released.^[20] Cave's second novel The Death of Bunny Munro was published on 8 September 2009 by Harper Collins books.^[21][22] It tells the story of a sex-addicted salesman, was also released as a binaural audio-book produced by British Artists Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard and an iPhone app.^[23] The book originally started as a screenplay Cave was going to write for John Hillcoat.^[24]

As proof of his interest in scripture, so evident in his lyrics and his prose writing, Cave wrote the foreword to a Canongate publication of the Gospel according to Mark, published in the UK in 1998. The American edition of the same book (published by Grove Press) contains a foreword by the noted American writer Barry Hannah.

Cave and Ellis composed scores for a production by the Icelandic theatre company Vesturport of Woyzeck by Georg Büchner, performed at the Barbican Theatre in the Barbican Arts Centre in London in 2005,^[25] and a stage adaptation of Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis at the Lyric Hammersmith in London in 2006.^[26]

Cave is a contributor to the 2009 rock biography on The Triffids Vagabond Holes: David McComb and the Triffids, edited by Australian academics Niall Lucy and Chris Coughran.^[27]

Acting and screenwriting[link]

Cave has made occasional appearances as an actor, most prominently in the 1989 film Ghosts ... of the Civil Dead, written and directed by John Hillcoat, and in the 1991 film Johnny Suede with Brad Pitt.

Cave appeared in the 2005 homage to Leonard Cohen, Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man, in which he performed "I'm Your Man" solo, and "Suzanne" with Julie Christensen and Perla Batalla. He also appeared in the 2007 film adaptation of Ron Hansen's novel The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, where he sings a song about Jesse James. Cave and Warren Ellis are credited for the film's soundtrack.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are also featured in Wim Wenders' 1987 film Wings of Desire.

Displaying a keen interest in other aspects of film, Cave wrote the screenplay for The Proposition, a film set in the colonial Australian Outback. Directed by John Hillcoat and filmed in Queensland in 2004, it premiered in October 2005 and has since been released worldwide to critical acclaim.^[28] The movie reviewer for British newspaper The Independent called it "peerless," "a star-studded and uncompromisingly violent outlaw film."^[29] It even features on a website promoting tourism to the area.^[30] The generally ambient soundtrack was recorded by Cave and Warren Ellis.

At the request of friend Russell Crowe, Cave wrote a script for a proposed sequel to Gladiator which was rejected by the studio.^[31]

His interest in the work of Edward Gorey led to his participation in the BBC Radio 3 programme, guest+host=ghost, featuring Peter Blegvad and the radiophonic sound of the Langham Research Centre.^[32]

Cave has also lent his voice in narrating an award winning animated film called The Cat Piano. It was directed by Eddie White and Ari Gibson (of The People's Republic Of Animation), produced by Jessica Brentnall and has music by Benjamin Speed.^[33]

Cave wrote the screenplay for The Wettest County in the World.,^[34] which has been renamed "Lawless", and has completed the script for a new film titled Death of a Ladies' Man and will rewrite the script of The Crow remake.

Currently, Cave is collaborating with Andy Serkis to develop a screen version of the Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht musical, The Threepenny Opera.^[35]

Personal life[link]

Cave dated Anita Lane from the late 1970s to mid 1980s. She had an undeniably strong influence upon Cave and his work, often cited as his "muse".^{[citation needed]} Despite this, Cave and Lane recorded together on only a few occasions. Their most notable collaborations include Lane's 'cameo' verse on Cave's Bob Dylan cover "Death Is Not The End" from the album Murder Ballads, and a cover of the Serge Gainsbourg/Jane Birkin song "Je t'aime, moi non plus/ I love you, nor do I". Lane co-wrote the lyrics to the title track for Cave's 1984 LP, From Her to Eternity, as well as the lyrics of the song "Stranger Than Kindness" from Your Funeral, My Trial. Cave, Lydia Lunch and Lane wrote a comic book together, entitled AS-FIX-E-8, in the style of the old "Pussy Galore"/Russ Meyer movies.

After completing his debut novel And the Ass Saw the Angel, Cave left West Berlin shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall and moved to São Paulo, Brazil, where he met Brazilian journalist Viviane Carneiro. The two have a son, Luke (b. 10 May 1991), but never married. Cave's son Jethro (born in 1991) lives with his mother, Beau Lazenby, in Australia and has a career in modelling.^[36]

Cave briefly dated PJ Harvey during the mid 1990s. The love affair and their break-up inspired him to write the album The Boatman's Call.

He met British model Susie Bick in 1997. A cover star of the Damned's 1985 album Phantasmagoria and a Vivienne Westwood model, she gave up her job when they married in summer 1999. They have twin sons, Arthur and Earl (born in 2000).^[37][38] Cave and Bick lived for some time on a houseboat near Hove. They currently live in Brighton and Hove, England.

Cave performed "Into My Arms" at the televised funeral of Michael Hutchence, but refused to play in front of the cameras. Cave is godfather of Hutchence's only child, Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily.^[39]

In the past, Cave identified as a Christian. In his recorded lectures on music and songwriting, he has claimed that any true love song is a song for God and has ascribed the mellowing of his music to a shift in focus from the Old to the New Testaments. He does not belong to a particular denomination and has distanced himself from "religion as being an American thing, in which the name of God has been hijacked".^[40] He said in a recent Los Angeles Times article: "I'm not religious, and I'm not a Christian, but I do reserve the right to believe in the possibility of a god. It's kind of defending the indefensible, though; I'm critical of what religions are becoming, the more destructive they're becoming. But I think as an artist, particularly, it's a necessary part of what I do, that there is some divine element going on within my songs".^[41]

Discography[link]

Cave performing in 2008

Soundtracks/scores[link]

• And the Ass Saw the Angel, readings of the novel (1988), plus theatre score (1993) – text by Cave, music composed by Harvey and Ed Clayton-Jones
• To Have and to Hold, soundtrack (1996) – composed with Harvey & Bargeld
• Woyzeck, theatre score (2005) – composed with Warren Ellis^[42] (Not available on CD or vinyl.)
• The Proposition, soundtrack (2005) – composed with Ellis
• Metamorphosis, theatre score (2006) – composed with Ellis^[43] (Not available on CD or vinyl.)
• The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, soundtrack (2007) – composed with Ellis
• The English Surgeon, soundtrack (2007) – composed with Ellis^[44] (Not available on CD or vinyl; only available on White Lunar; see below.)
• The Girls of Phnom Penh, soundtrack (2009) – composed with Ellis^[45] (Not available on CD or vinyl; only available on White Lunar; see below.)
• The Death of Bunny Munro, soundtrack (2009) – composed with Ellis^[46]
• The Road, soundtrack (2009) – composed with Ellis^[47] (Soundtrack released in January 12, 2010)^[48]
• White Lunar, soundtrack compilation (2009) – composed with Ellis^[49] (2CDs. Disc one contains high lights from The Proposition, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, and The Road. Disc 2 contains work from The English Surgeon and The Girls of Phnom Penh, as well as four unreleased pieces "from the archives".^[50]
• The Metamorphosis, (Forvandlingen- Norwegian national theatre) soundtrack (2012) –

Contributions/appearances[link]

• Die Haut and Nick Cave: Burnin' the Ice (1982), features Nick Cave's vocals on songs 1,3,5,6 (Stow-A-Way, Truck Love, Pleasure Is The Boss, Dumb Europe).
• Smack My Crack (1987), features Nick Cave performing "The Altra Virago Or The Vargus Barking Spider".
• Wings Of Desire (1987), Nick Cave appears in the film, where he performs "The Carny" and "From Her To Eternity".
• "Helpless" single by Neil Young. He did this in 1989 for the Neil Young tribute album The Bridge.
• Leonard Cohen: I'm your Fan (1991), Nick Cave "Tower Of Song".
• Until The End Of The World (1991), Nick Cave "(I'll Love You) Till The End Of The World".
• In Weiter Ferne, So Nah! (aka Faraway So Close!) (1993), Nick Cave "Faraway So Close" and "Cassiel's Song".
• Zero Effect (1994), Nick Cave "Into My Arms".
• Batman Forever soundtrack (1995). Cave contributes the track "There is a Light".
• Scream (1996), Nick Cave "Red Right Hand".
• X-Files Songs In The Key Of X (1996), Nick Cave "Red Right Hand".
• September Songs: The Music of Kurt Weill (1997) produced by Hal Willner. Cave contributes a cover version of "Mack the Knife".
• Nick Cave i Przyjaciele (Nick Cave and Friends) (1991). A tribute album by Polish musicians. Cave appears on tracks 1 & 10. (Into My Arms, The Weeping Song)
• The Acid House (1999), Nick Cave/Barry Adamson "Sweetest Embrace".
• A Tribute to Polnareff, a Tribute album to Michel Polnareff. Nick Cave contributes a cover version of "Goodbye Marylou".
• Ute Lemper's Punishing Kiss (2000). Cave co-wrote (with Bruno Pisek) "Little Water Song".
• He Died With A FelaFel In His Hand (2001) Nick Cave "The Mercy Seat (Live)" & "Into My Arms".
• Intimite (aka Intimacy) (2001), Nick Cave "In The Ghetto".
• "To Be By Your Side" – from the OST for French documentary film Le Peuple Migrateur (2001).
• I Am Sam (2002). Cave contributes a cover version of The Beatles' "Let It Be", which was later issued as a single with a cover version of "Here Comes the Sun" as the B-side.
• "Bad Cover Version" single by Pulp (2002). Cave contributes a cover version of Pulp's "Disco 2000".
• American IV: The Man Comes Around (2003) Duet with Johnny Cash on "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry".
• "Kiss of Love" (duet with Sam Brown) from Jools Holland's 2003 album Small World Big Band Friends 3 – Jack O The Green.
• Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds appear on the Martin Scorsese series The Blues (2003) singing J. B. Lenoir's "I Feel So Good".
• Shrek 2 (2004), Nick Cave "People Aint' No Good".
• The Passion Of The Christ - Songs Inspired By (2004), Nick Cave "Darker With The Day".
• Harry Smith Project Vol 1 (2006), Nick Cave "John The Revelator" and Vol 2 "Shine On Me".
• Cave performs "I'm Your Man" and "Suzanne" in the documentary/concert film Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man (2006).
• Q Covered - Best Of 86/06 (2006), Nick Cave sings Pulp's "Disco 2000".
• Rogue's Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs, and Chanteys (2006). Cave contributes the tracks "Fire Down Below" and "Pinery Boy".
• Seasick Steve's song "Just Like A King", from the album I Started Out With Nothin' (2008)includes Cave's vocals.
• Californication Season 2 (2009), Nick Cave "Moonland".
• Mojo Presents The Score 20 Ultra Cool Soundtracks (2009), Nick Cave "Let It Be".
• Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds song "Up Jumped The Devil" was featured in the video game Alan Wake. (2010)
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 (2010). Cave contributed the song "O Children".
• Leonard Cohen By En Boca De (2011), Nick Cave "Avalanche".
• Trentemoller - Late Night Tales (2011), Nick Cave & Warren Ellis "The Proposition #1".
• Nick Cave joins Neko Case to cover the The Zombies song She's Not There for HBO show True Blood.^[51] (2011)

Spoken-word lectures[link]

• The Secret Life Of The Love Song & The Flesh Made Word: Two Lectures (2000).

Bibliography[link]

• King Ink (1988)
• And the Ass Saw the Angel (1989)
• King Ink II (1997)
• The Pocket Canons: Books of the Bible (1998)
  • Cave wrote the introduction to The Gospel According to Mark.
• Complete Lyrics (2001)
• The Complete Lyrics: 1978-2006 (2007)
• The Death of Bunny Munro (2009)

Awards and honours[link]

• 2012 Doctor of Letters, an honorary degree from the University of Brighton.^[52]
• 2011 Straight to you - Triple j's tribute tour to Nick Cave for his work in Australian music for Ausmusic Month
• 2011 MOJO Awards: Song of the Year for "Heathen Child" by Grinderman
• 2010 made an honorary Doctor of Laws, by University of Dundee.^[53]
• 2008 ARIA Awards Male Artist of the Year (Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!).^[54]
• 2008 MOJO Awards: Best Album of 2008 (Dig, Lazarus Dig!!!).
• 2008 Awarded an Honorary degree as Doctor of Laws, by Monash University.^[55]
• 2007 ARIA Awards ARIA Hall of Fame inductee.^[54]
• 2006 Venice Film Festival: Gucci Award (for the script to The Proposition).
• 2005 Q magazine: Q Classic Songwriter Award.
• 2005 AFI Awards: Best Original Music Score with Warren Ellis (The Proposition).
• 2005 Inside Film Awards: Best Music (The Proposition).
• 2005 Film Critics Circle of Australia Awards: Best Musical Score (The Proposition).
• 2004 MOJO Awards: Best Album of 2004 (Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus).
• 2001 ARIA Awards: Best Male Artist (No More Shall We Part).^[54]
• 2001 APRA Music Awards: "The Ship Song" voted in the Top 30 Best Australian Songs of the previous 75 years.^[56]
• 1997 APRA Music Awards: Songwriter of the year.
• 1997 ARIA Awards: Best Original Soundtrack (To Have and to Hold).^[54]
• 1996 ARIA Awards: Song of the Year & Single of the Year & Best Pop Release ("Where the Wild Roses Grow").^[54]
• 1996 MTV Europe Music Awards: Nick Cave formally requested that his nomination for "Best Male Artist" be withdrawn as he was not comfortable with the "competitive nature" of such awards.
• 1990 Time Out Magazine: Book Of The Year (And the Ass Saw the Angel).

Further reading[link]

• Bad Seed: A Biography of Nick Cave, Ian Johnston (1997) ISBN 0-316-90833-9
• The Life and Music of Nick Cave: An Illustrated Biography, Maximilian Dax & Johannes Beck (1999) ISBN 3-931126-27-7
• Liner notes to the CDs Original Seeds: Songs that inspired Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Kim Beissel (1998 & 2004), Rubber Records
• Kicking Against the Pricks: An Armchair Guide to Nick Cave, Amy Hanson (2005), ISBN 1-900924-96-X
• Nick Cave Stories, Janine Barrand (2007)
• Cultural Seeds: Essays on the Work of Nick Cave, eds. Karen Welberry and Tanya Dalziell (2009) ISBN 0-7546-6395-7
• Nick Cave Sinner Saint: The True Confessions, ed. Mat Snow (2011) ISBN 978-0-85965-448-7

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nick Cave

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Nick Cave

• Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds official website