Nick Cave

Nick Cave is someone I've always been aware of , yet I've only got into his music relatively recently. I watched a compilation of his appearances on Jools Holland's Later the other day and it was fascinating to see the way in which he's evolved over the years. The earliest performances were from around 1990, when he would have been in his early 30s, and the most recent in March this year, so there was nearly 20 years to look at and appreciate.
He has certainly, unlike many musicians, become rougher round the edges as he's got older - his performing style is pretty deranged nowadays. The 50-year-old Cave is a true original, wild and woolly, and his recent garage-band album, Grinderman, and his latest, Dig, Lazurus, Dig, are albums I'll certainly be getting as soon as possible. I think my musical taste is evolving along a similar trajectory.
He's open about his insistence on dying his hair a stern and uncompromising black, has a fearsome moustache, and often dresses in an un-popstar-like suit and tie. He has an extensive online presence, with personal websites and a MySpace page which has several tracks available for listening. Films are something he's heavily involved in, doing the soundtrack for The Proposition and appearing in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, a wonderful film, whose treatment at the hands of the distributors was nothing short of scandalous. (It appeared at the Watershed in Bristol for a couple of weeks, and that was that. Although Roger Deakins won an Oscar for his cinematography, it was shamefully neglected in all the other categories, in spite of it featuring Brad Pitt's finest performance to date - I could go on...).
I discovered from his Wikipedia site that one of his songs featured in Ascension, an X-Files episode. Apparently, although he doesn't watch much television, he's a fan of the show, which in my book, is a major badge of honour. (I'm a massive fan myself, and will be blogging soon on the subject). I could go on on - what is there not to like? He also writes and paints, but one of his most endearing features is his Australian nationality. In spite of the fact that he now lives in Brighton, he's very much an Aussie. His singing's a bit tuneless, and his 'dancing' is not great, but he's retained a punk sensibility, while becoming a fascinating personality, and a bit of a polymath.
Anway, he's a pretty recent discovery for me, so there's lots to look forward to as I discover his stuff.