Nick Cave to release ‘Idiot Prayer’ show as live album and in cinemas

The November releases are being teased with footage of 'Galleon Ship' from the Alexandra Palace show

Nick Cave is set to release his recent ‘Idiot Prayer’ livestream show as a live album, with it also set to come to cinemas.

‘Idiot Prayer’, a full-length solo piano show recorded at London’s Alexandra Palace, was broadcast online back in July.

The film will now be released in cinemas on November 5, with tickets on sale for screenings from September 10.

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A traditional album release will then follow on November 20, available on vinyl, CD and digitally.

Ahead of the releases, Cave has today shared footage of him performing ‘Galleon Ship’, from his 2019 album ‘Ghosteen’, as part of the ‘Idiot Prayer’ performance – watch it below.

“The film ‘Idiot Prayer’ evolved from my ‘Conversations With…’ events,” Cave explained of the film. I loved playing deconstructed versions of my songs at these shows, distilling them to their essential forms. I felt I was rediscovering the songs all over again, and started to think about going into a studio and recording these reimagined versions at some stage – whenever I could find the time.

“Then, the pandemic came – the world went into lockdown, and fell into an eerie, self-
reflective silence. It was within this silence that I began to think about the idea of not only recording the songs, but also filming them.”

He added: “We worked with the team at Alexandra Palace – a venue I have played and love – on securing a date to film just as soon as they were allowed to re-open the building to us. On 19th June 2020, surrounded by Covid officers with tape measures and thermometers, masked-up gaffers and camera operators, nervous looking technicians and buckets of hand gel, we created something very strange and very beautiful that spoke into this uncertain time, but was in no way bowed by it.

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“This is the album taken from that film. It is a prayer into the void – alone at Alexandra
Palace – a souvenir from a strange and precarious moment in history. I hope you enjoy
it.”

Reviewing ‘Idiot Prayer’, NME wrote: “Without crowds, chatter and the mess of thousands of human bodies all bumping up against each other, it’s possible to focus purely on Cave’s devastating lyricism: religion, death and romance all getting their chance to shine in the golden and purple lights that softly illuminate the room.”

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