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The Sick Bag Song

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The Sick Bag Song

By: Nick Cave
Narrated by: Nick Cave
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THE SICK BAG SONG chronicles Cave's journey with his band the Bad Seeds on a twenty-two-day, North American tour. It is a highly personal account that blends memories, musings, poetry, lyrics, flights of fancy and road journal.

Drawing inspiration from Leonard Cohen, John Berryman, Patti Smith, Sharon Olds, folk ballads and ancient texts, THE SICK BAG SONG takes the form of an epic quest, turning over questions of inspiration, creativity, loss, death and romantic love. It is also a companion piece to his feature documentary 20,000 Days on Earth. THE SICK BAG SONG explores and develops the mystique of Nick Cave.

©2016 Canongate Books Music Entertainment
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Critic reviews

"About as rock'n'roll as you can get . . . [The Sick Bag Song] is shot through with fantasy, fiction, apocalyptic musings and tall stories"
"An epic narrative poem about his travels across North America . . . Cave is experimenting with a new literary form - a mash-up of prose, poetry, song lyrics and autobiography"
"The Sick Bag Song provides a window on Cave's honesty . . . Part tour diary and part free-ranging rumination on the business of performance. Capture[s] the mind-frazzling disorientation of "the road""
"Lyrical, hallucinatory and laced with sly wit, The Sick Bag Song is a revelation and a pleasure" (Hari Kunzru)
"Mad and amazing" (Ian Rankin)
"Nick Cave goes the distance with The Sick Bag Song"
"Far from your typical diary; snapshots of mundane reality (traffic jams, reading in a park) melt into disturbing visions peppered with flashbacks from his childhood. There are heated exchanges between Cave and his muses, and unsettling encounters with a few of his musical heroes (Bryan Ferry, Bob Dylan) that cause Cave to ponder the "vampiric" nature of creativity"
"The narrator's obsessive thoughts about his young self facing death juxtaposed with the illusions of fame . . . offer an interesting perspective on mortality"
"The stories twist and turn like mad dash through the dark forest that is Nick Caves imagination. It's very revealing, but I guess it's too dreamlike to be called a diary or journal, and yet I came away understanding more about Nick Cave than ever" (Tom Odell)
"Biblical, slightly manic and distinctly berserk; it's also touching, poignant and utterly absorbing" (Jason Steger)
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Nick Cave narrates his masterpiece with powerful emotion. Such a wonderful journey of longing for his beautiful wife while on tour. It’s a beautiful blend of memories, musings, poetry, lyrics, flights of fancy and road journal. It is comic honesty Listen to the Sick Bag song, you’ll love it.

Absolutely brilliant!

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A real journey that keeps you engrossed throughout!! It simply grabs you takes you along for the ride. Through perfectly chosen words, you'll feel like you understand Nick Cave's perspective on the world a little better from listening to this!

An emotional masterpiece!!!

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fabulous. fabulous. fabulous. This is a must. Beautifully poetic from start to finish. 5 Stars

fabulous

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Lovely insight into creativity 'at work'.
The inspiring riff on procrastination will chuckle the guts of readers who also write.

Great creative flow

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Listened to it in one sitting. Nick Cave reading hos own words to you as he pines for his wife on tour and waxes lyrical about it. I reckon I'll listen to it again before long. Just great.

An epic poem

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