Nick Cave shares how he keeps ‘intrusive late-night thinking at bay’ in latest Red Hand Files post

Nick Cave has shared with Red Hand Files readers how he manages to keep “intrusive late-night thinking at bay’.

The Bad Seeds frontman confirmed that, while the process works for him, it may prove to be ineffective for others. Cave shared how he deals with the nighttime tensions in his latest post. A fan asked: “How do you sleep at night? As someone who lies awake for at least an hour every night, I wonder how you go about silencing the endless churn of the mind. Do you fall easily beneath the surface of dreams, or do you lie there in the blue glow of midnight, dwelling on fragments of memory, lyrical musings, restless visions, and the strange parade of thoughts that arrive uninvited and refuse to leave?”

Cave responded: “I go to bed around midnight, but before I have time for any blue glow, dwelling on fragments of memory, or lyrical musings, I put on a podcast, which keeps intrusive late-night thinking at bay. This podcast generally amounts to one person who doesn’t know what they’re talking about, talking to another person who doesn’t know what they’re talking about, about something I know absolutely nothing about, and this triumvirate of stupidity generally lulls me into some approximation of sleep (the first sleep).

“I wake three hours later. I get up and go downstairs, where I read something soothing for half an hour or so – at the moment, The Owl – a Biography, The House at Pooh Corner or The Art of Bible Translation. Then I go back to bed, podcast-free, for another three hours (the second sleep). I wake around 6am from a mostly dreamless sleep, go back downstairs and eat a bowl of Grape Nuts (still).

“I meditate and pray – and then I read some Red Hand Files questions, which often amounts to the same thing. After a while, I go back to the bedroom, sit on the edge of the bed, and find out how all the ghosts are getting on as Susie wakes and tells me about her dreams. The dead frequently visit Susie at night, but her dreams are generally happy, trouble-free affairs.

“Last night she dreamed that her dog Otis, who died last year, was waving to her from across a wide stretch of water. As I rarely dream, Susie essentially does my dreaming for me. After I shower, I put on a suit (Nyx, women, in general, in my considerable experience, love a man or, it seems, a woman in a suit) and I head off to work.

“This morning, I am going to Islington to mess around in the studio with Marty (he’s well now), Thomas (him too), Jim (always robust), and Warren (still lovely and deranged) with the vague idea of perhaps making a new record. In the back of the cab, conscious that I haven’t got time to write anything more substantial this week, I knock out this Red Hand File, fully aware, dear reader, that it’s kind of crap. This doesn’t mean I don’t love you. I do. But forgive me all the same.”