Up to a point, you always know what you're going to get with Nick Cave. He's unlikely to swerve off into disco or the great American songbook. So Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! is compelled by instinct to return to certain obsessions in the same way that a murderer always returns to the scene of the crime. There's oodles of sex; death, literature, religion and a very generous bellyful of laughs.
As a man who always runs the risk of toppling into caricature, Cave recognizes that, as he sings near the end of this hugely entertaining album, 'The game is never won/By standing in any one place for too long.' After the Stoogian clatter of Grinderman, Cave and the Bad Seeds regroup this time around with a little more consideration and restraint. At first Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! sounds a little too straightforward, before the sheer extent of its ambition becomes evident.
Musically, the album is a triumph from first to last. Built around a deep, Doors-y swirl of sound, the bass-heavy groove is crucial in binding together the scattered outpourings of Cave's fevered imagination. The faster songs drive and thrust, while the slower set-pieces are loose and serpentine, allowing the words plenty of space.
And, what words.
There is not a whiff here of the confessional, heart-sick soul who wept through The Boatman's Call. Cave avoids romantic love, with the exception of the outstanding 'Jesus of the Moon'.
This is an entire, self-contained world, melodic, accessible without ever being too decipherable. Words and ideas spill out all over the place. If there is one overriding message it seems to be that the world is burrowing into hell but there is much fun to be had as it does so. Rarely has the exhortation to pick up a shovel and start digging sounded quite so affirming.
from The Guardian, February, 2008