To say there’s an air of excitement around the ChainSlap turntables right now would be a pretty large understatement. That we are going to witness live two of our all-time favourite artists within the space of a week seems at once both a dream and concurrently a little daunting. Will one overshadow the other? Or will the juxtaposition of light, dark, woman, man, love, loss, be a fitting conduit to the perfect storm of each of those elements that emanates from both. It has to be the latter, especially as Ms Harvey will follow Mr Cave and probably go some way to lifting any lingering melancholy that may have settled upon us after experiencing an undoubtedly solemn and grieving man purging his soul in the only way he can; through performance.

With their shows occurring so close together, the thought that maybe, just maybe their schedules would coincide in some way that one may appear at the other’s show tantalised, albeit momentarily. A quick yet thorough number crunch reveals that no such luck will bestow Australian or NZ fans, denying us the rare opportunity to witness what would be an intense reprise of their classic duet Henry Lee.

The video for their iconic version of the song offers more than just visual accompaniment; it portrays a real-life love affair unfolding before our eyes. Cave summarised it thusly:

“Fucking hell! That’s a one-take video. Nothing is rehearsed at all except we sit on this ‘love seat’. We didn’t know each other well, and this thing happens while we’re making the video. There’s a certain awkwardness, and afterwards it’s like, oh…” So you were beginning the relationship in this three-minute video? “Yeah, exactly.”

If the romance spawned by the video was intense, then the subsequent break-up was even more so. Both Harvey and Cave were deeply affected, which had the converse affect of them producing arguably their finest personal masterpieces, Is This Desire and The Boatman’s Call respectively. Watching the Henry Lee video now, and knowing what resulted from it, it’s hard not to equate it with a more exalted reverie than just a simple four-minute filler, but the catalyst for so much more.

*Since this article was written I’ve come to discover many disturbing things about Cave, Harvey, their cohorts and practices. I can no longer listen to their music, and the knowledge of how these people and the wider entertainment industry operates has sickened me to the core. It’s very saddening to realise our heroes are scum.