“This is a f***ing disaster waiting to happen,” said Nick Cave, judging the gap he had to leap between the stage and platforms designed for him to sing directly to the front rows.
It seemed a precarious set-up for the band’s biggest ever London show, though he was an eminently agile 60-year-old who roamed amid the audience and performed with a fervency that was more preacher than pop star.
Last year’s harrowing Skeleton Tree album, completed following the accidental death of Cave’s 15-year-old son, was played almost in its entirety — a cathartic concert experience for the singer.
He was often among his congregation, clasping hands and launching himself into the crowd during the incendiary Higgs Boson Blues.
The astonishing band could still whip up a punky squall. From Her to Eternity, released in 1984, had Warren Ellis punishing his violin as if playing heavy rock riffs. Seated at a piano for the quieter songs, Cave invited us to join in on Into My Arms, which ultimately featured a choir of thousands. Brooding ballad Jubilee Street was dedicated to “my wife, the fox”.
She was lucky not to be singled out like Primal Scream’s Bobby Gillespie, who sang an impromptu duet of Push the Sky Away when a wandering Cave found him in the seated area.
Cave also encouraged a mass stage invasion during the encore of Stagger Lee — the frontman and the Bad Seeds at their baleful best.
An emotionally charged performance tinged with tragedy, their O2 show was a remarkable triumph.
