There's a great line in Chinatown when John Huston tells Jack Nicholson, "Of course they respect me; I'm old. Whores, politicians, and ugly buildings all get respectable if they last long enough." I think someone should add punk icons to that list. No one seems to mind that Lou Reed has been riding his reputation for years, turning out adequate, but ultimately bland concept albums. Iggy Pop is always a welcome, if none-too-surprising weekly feature on "Behind the Music." And hell, seeing Johnny Rotten weep was one of the high points of the Sex Pistols documentary The Filth and the Fury. All of which makes one think that someday, maybe Henry Rollins will produce an album of acoustic love ballads/gospel music that older rock critics will deem "hauntingly personal."

None of this bodes very well for Nick Cave's latest, No More Shall We Part, and for good reason. While No More features all the brooding, broken hearts, hideous death stories, and forced pentameters as you'd expect from the Great Coiffure. Plus, it's nice to report that Cave's lyrics are still as earnest, and unsparing as any high school poetry we've ever read.

But goddamn if he doesn't sing like a cranky Neil Diamond here. Yeah. Neil Diamond. Until now, playing "name that influence" has always been part of the fun with Cave. I've heard Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen in Cave's music before, but this Neil shit is seriously freaking my ass out. This, along with the addition of the Dirty Three's Warren Ellis as his newest Bad Seed, seem to be the only departures here from Cave's last album. What I'm saying is, it's The Boatman's Call featuring Neil Diamond with strings. That's right-- strings. And as everyone knows, string arrangements = artistic maturity.

Oh yeah, and Nick still likes God. He also wants to stress that he's still saved, though, oddly enough, he seems about as unhappy about it as his fans do. I suppose it was too much to hope for a Cave-Satan reunion. Of course, like all of Cave's religious material, it sometimes-- in far more moderation than he offers here-- sounds like the music you'd find playing in a run-down southern chapel you might stumble across in your adolescent beatnik road-trip fantasies. "God's Hotel" is one of the greatest b-side gospel songs ever, but I'd still prefer to stumble across Tom Waits whipped up into a Jesus frenzy. And after its third extended chorus of "Oh Lord/ Oh Lord/ Oh Lord/ Oh Lord," and, "Save yourself/ Save yourself/ Save yourself," the Lord really wears out his welcome. I guess it's nice that Cave gets to go to Heaven, though-- he can hang out with Jars of Clay!

No More Shall We Part isn't without its high points, and the high points are on par with everything you've liked about late-90's Cave. Unfortunately, it also carries the curse of most Cave music. A song can begin exceptionally well, only to draw itself out into a long-winded wankfest. The shorter, more romantic material works much better, even if "The Sorrowful Wife," and "Love Letter" proudly flaunt their Neil streak. They're still quite good, though, and the gorgeous closer, "Darker with the Day," hints at the glory that still lies buried beneath all this fucking redemption.

It's not as if Cave has stumbled down the dark and evil path carved by so many non-punk icons (i.e., the album was not produced by Babyface). In fact, No More Shall We Part is as wonderfully, consciously un-marketable as anything Cave has ever done. Whatever you want to think about Nick, you can never say it's ever been "about the money, man." And that's extraordinarily refreshing in a world ruled by Jive Records.

-Brad Pritchett