I write hate lyrics really well. It's not every day you can use them, really. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I don't write happy songs. Who does? I don't know anybody who writes happy songs, really. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I always thought my records were number one; it's just the charts didn't think so. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
When you're talking about rock n' roll, myth-making is what it's all about. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The way I take in the world is by seeing it; that is very much evident in the songs that I write. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
There are times when I think I can sing it better, but usually I find that I can't. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The big problem with songwriting for me is starting a new song. It's the thing where all the anguish exists, not in… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The love song must be born into the realm of the irrational, absurd, the distracted, the melancholic, the obsessive, the insane for… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
What you're really after when you see a film or listen to a song is a singular vision, and I'm not sure… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
My music has to do with beauty, and it's intended to, if not lift the spirits, then be a kind of a… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
“I’m forever near a stereo saying, ‘What the fuck is this garbage?’ And the answer is always the Red Hot Chili Peppers.” — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I write songs from the point of view I had at a time;I'm not tryingto write songs from a young person's point… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I want to write songs that are so sad, the kind of sad where you take someone's little finger and break it… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I love rock-n-roll. I think it's an exciting art form. It's revolutionary. Still revolutionary and it changed people. It changed their hearts.… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Everybody tends to overplay live. That's just the nature of playing live. And that can be great, but it can also kill… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Music is storming, driving, relentless, devotional, slinky, subtle, heartbreakingly-beautiful sounds that, lyrically, switch from the cynical to the sanguine, the defeated to… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The idea of songwriting is a transformative thing, and what I do with songwriting is take situations that are quite ordinary and… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I feel like I've spent the last five years of my life on the road. It hasn't affected my songs but it's… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The band is a living, breathing thing. It grows in the same way we do as human beings and if it doesn't,… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Songs need to have the ability to change and to grow for sure. They take on lives of their own. Some songs… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
There's an element to songwriting that I can't explain, that comes from somewhere else. I can't explain that dividing line between nothing… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The more settled I've become, the more problematic my characters have become. There was a period when I wrote sensitive and gentle… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The reason I've gotten into script-writing, which was accidental to begin with, was that I found it was a far more effective… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
“The boy will grow older, and over time there will be other songs – not many – ten or maybe twenty in… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The actualising of God through the medium of the love song remains my prime motivation as an artist. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Songwriting, I have to take myself away from everybody to do. It's an unsightly act. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I've always hated narrative songs. I hate those songs where, basically, it's an unfolding of a story. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I'm unable to really write the kind of song that doesn't have a visual element, which most songs don't. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Sometimes the song isn't strong enough to contain the fiction, because memories are fictions. — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Self-editing is the way I write. Ten verses of a song and it's finished. Then we start playing it and if I… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The songs that I like are the ones that you can't visualize, that are just cries from the heart - those very… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
Rock music is the province of the young, and it should be made by young people. I'm not running around in a… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I see it as my duty in some way is to be out in the world as an Australian putting forward what… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
The big problem with songwriting for me is starting a new song. It's the thing where all the anguish exists, not in… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
With writing a song, I've always felt, right from the start, like I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel. I don't ever… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
I write songs in batches and then record them and then can't write again for ages. I try and build one song… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
My responsibility as an artist is to turn up at the page or the piano or the microphone. The rest is up… — Nick Cave Copy Share Image
“And I know why our friendship must be kept a secret. Or they will kill You like they killed You in the Bible. And… — Nick Cave Copy Share
I want to write songs that are so sad, the kind of sad where you take someone's little finger and break it in three… — Nick Cave Copy Share
“Through these days Bunny made increasingly frequent and protracted visits to the bathroom, beating off with a single-minded savagery intense even by Bunny's standards.… — Nick Cave Copy Share
That's what we [outsiders] feel America is really about - the kind of crazed ravings of the Christian right - when it's probably something… — Nick Cave Copy Share
“My relationship with my muse is a delicate one at the best of times and I feel that it is my duty to protect… — Nick Cave Copy Share
I'm kind of old-school and love nothing more than sitting, opening a book, and reading it. But I also love listening to audio books. — Nick Cave Copy Share
Early on I realized when you write a song about someone, it flatters them on some level, and gives you a lot of room… — Nick Cave Copy Share
My father was a teacher and my mother also worked in the school, so the family has a background in education. — Nick Cave Copy Share
I think it's an essential fact for any performer or artist to fail as poignantly as they can succeed. — Nick Cave Copy Share
To my undying shame, I do read reviews. I don't read them all, but I like to get some kind of idea how things… — Nick Cave Copy Share
Brother, be a brother, fill this tiny cup of mine. And please, sir, make it whiskey: I have no head for wine! — Nick Cave Copy Share
When you've been initiated, you can stand in the world differently. And I think it is up to all of us, we can have… — Nick Cave Copy Share
Polly Jean, I love you. I love the texture of your skin, the taste of your saliva, the softness of your ears. I love… — Nick Cave Copy Share
