I'm pacing up and down my room
Does Jesus only love a man who loses?
I turn on the radio
There's some cat on the saxophone
Laying down a litany of excuses
There's madhouse longing in my baby's eyes
She rubs a lamp between her thighs
And hopes the genie comes out singing
And she lives in some forgotten song
And moves like she is zombie-strong
Breathes steady as the pendulum keeps swinging
You better hold on to yourself
Well, cities rust and fall to ruin
Factories close and cars go cruising
In and around the borders of her vision
She says oh woah woah woah
As Jesus makes the flowers grow
All around the scene of her collision
Oh you know, yes, I would
I would hold on to yourself
In the middle of the night
I try my best to chase outside
The phantoms and the ghosts and the fairy-girls
On 1001 nights like this
She mutters open sesame and Ali Baba and his forty thieves
Launch her off the face of the world
Well, you know
Oh baby, I'll come back
And I'll hold on to yourself
Babe, I'm 1000 miles away
And I just don't know what to say
'Cause Jesus only loves a man who bruises
But darling we can clearly see
It's all life and fire and lunacy
And excuses and excuses and excuses
Well, you know if I could I would
Yeah, I would lie right down
And I'd hold on to yourself
Yeah, I would lie right down
And I would hold on to yourself
One day I'll come back to you
And I'll hold on to yourself
Yeah, I'm gonna come back
Gonna lie down
And I'll hold on to yourself
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian rock band formed in 1983 by vocalist Nick Cave, multi-instrumentalist Mick Harvey and guitarist-vocalist Blixa Bargeld. The band has featured international personnel throughout its career and presently consists of Cave, violinist and multi-instrumentalist Warren Ellis, bassist Martyn P. Casey (all from Australia), guitarist George Vjestica (United Kingdom), keyboardist/percussionist Larry Mullins, also known as Toby Dammit (United States), and drummers Thomas Wydler (Switzerland) and Jim Sclavunos (United States). Described as "one of the most original and celebrated bands of the post-punk and alternative rock eras in the '80s and onward", they have released seventeen studio albums and completed numerous international tours.
The band was founded following the demise of Cave and Harvey's former group the Birthday Party, the members of which met at a boarding school in Melbourne. Throughout the 1980s, beginning with their debut LP From Her to Eternity (1984), the band drew largely on post-punk, blues and gothic rock, and formed an evolving, multinational lineup, bringing in musicians such as Blixa Bargeld, Barry Adamson and Kid Congo Powers. The band later softened their sound and incorporated other influences on albums such as The Good Son (1990) and The Boatman's Call (1997). Following Harvey's departure in 2009, the band broadened their sound further to include electronic and ambient styles, which feature prominently on the trilogy of albums Push the Sky Away (2013), Skeleton Tree (2016) and Ghosteen (2019).
