On his first solo album, recorded after the dissolution of The Birthday Party, Nick Cave doesn’t sound renewed, so much as dragged – willingly, mind you – through the mud. There are echoes of the Grand Guignol post-punk of his former group on songs like “Cabin Fever!,” but the core of From Her To Eternity is a cover, Leonard Cohen’s “Avalanche,” that reads as a re-consideration of what song can do for Cave, and the mordant, sinuous title track. The most startling thing here is the way Cave’s new bandmates disrupt the mise en scène, from Barry Adamson’s elastic bass, to the clangourous, riveting guitar of Blixa Bargeld – a master disruptor.

– Jon Dale