Following the success of his streamed performance at London’s Alexandra Palace in July, Nick Cave’s Idiot Prayer – Nick Cave Alone at Alexandra Palace is going be screened globally in theaters on Nov. 5.
Two weeks after that debut, the music from the show will be released in a double album featuring all 22 songs from the concert film. The LP will be available on vinyl, CD and digital streaming.
Nick Cave said in a statement:
“The film ‘Idiot Prayer’ evolved from my ‘Conversations With…’ events. 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.
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.
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.”
Idiot Prayer, filmed by cinematographer Robbie Ryan, is Nick Cave’s fourth film with Trafalgar Releasing. It follows 2018’s Distant Sky – Live in Copenhagen directed by David Barnard; 2016’s One More Time With Feeling directed by Andrew Dominik; and 2014’s award-winning 20,000 Days on Earth, directed by Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard.
Tickets for the Nov. 5 screening go on sale Sept.10 — excluding the US, where an on-sale date is yet to be announced.
Watch Nick Cave perform “Galleon Ship” from Idiot Prayer below.
