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Nick Cave's Bar
A mission to find a mythological watering hole... In June 1999, Aug Stone and his best friend flew to Germany to find the bar they had heard Nick Cave owned in Berlin. They assumed they would get off the plane, ask 'which way to Nick Cave's bar?', and then spend the rest of their time living it up amidst the wild world of its confines. Instead what followed were nine days of confusion, thwarted plans, and perpetual drunken misery. To this day, they're not sure Nick Cave ever owned a bar in Berlin.
Aug Stone is a writer, comedian, & musician. Stone is the author of the comedy novel Off-License To Kill, and his journalism has appeared in The Quietus, The Comics Journal, Under The Radar, and many other sites and magazines. He performs comedy as Young Southpaw, bringing his surreal stories to the world via The Young Southpaw Part Of An Hour podcast and 'blends the arts with the absurd' on his interview show Etcetera ETC With Young Southpaw.
Aug Stone is a writer, comedian, & musician. Stone is the author of the comedy novel Off-License To Kill, and his journalism has appeared in The Quietus, The Comics Journal, Under The Radar, and many other sites and magazines. He performs comedy as Young Southpaw, bringing his surreal stories to the world via The Young Southpaw Part Of An Hour podcast and 'blends the arts with the absurd' on his interview show Etcetera ETC With Young Southpaw.
142 pages, Paperback
Published December 2, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 22, 2022
If Trainspotting’s Begbie was to go on a road-trip with the Inbetweeners we will be almost at the level of alcohol imbibed within the pages of this book…what is more impressive is that this is achieved in under 150 pages. Everybody has one of those moments in their life where a passing comment sticks with you forever, for Aug it was asking a girl if she likes Nick Cave and she replies that Cave has a bar in Berlin, Aug instantly knows that he will be attempting to locate this bar. Back home best mate Andy has been told and is on board…this all happens in the 1990’s and I guess it would have taken too long to load up Ask Jeeves so off they go with no research…how wrong could it go?
The first part of the book goes into detail about Aug’s love for music, the women he loved and the influences in his life, at first I was wondering why this was included but after a while I was hooked, great taste in music and movies, in fact this has to be the first book to give a shout out to Night Watch, great fricking movie. Then the book moves onto the trip to Germany, they don’t give themselves long to find the bar and things ain’t helped much by the constant drinking, including waaaay too much Absinthe which lead to intense hangovers, utter misery and many distractions around female Scottish football fans. I wouldn’t say it was a fun trip, the chaos and lost opportunities hit the guys hard but their friendship prevailed.
The end of the book contains a number of postscripts, updates in Aug’s life since the trip and a shocking moment. This was a great account of a monumental trip to find a bar that may or may not exist and well worth having a read.
PS: I heard that Bob Dylan owns a kebab van in Melbourne.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2022...
The first part of the book goes into detail about Aug’s love for music, the women he loved and the influences in his life, at first I was wondering why this was included but after a while I was hooked, great taste in music and movies, in fact this has to be the first book to give a shout out to Night Watch, great fricking movie. Then the book moves onto the trip to Germany, they don’t give themselves long to find the bar and things ain’t helped much by the constant drinking, including waaaay too much Absinthe which lead to intense hangovers, utter misery and many distractions around female Scottish football fans. I wouldn’t say it was a fun trip, the chaos and lost opportunities hit the guys hard but their friendship prevailed.
The end of the book contains a number of postscripts, updates in Aug’s life since the trip and a shocking moment. This was a great account of a monumental trip to find a bar that may or may not exist and well worth having a read.
PS: I heard that Bob Dylan owns a kebab van in Melbourne.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2022...
September 20, 2023
Aug Stone wants you to think he’s cool. Most of this “memoir” is spent trying to prove just that by listing off damn near every vinyl he’s bought or book he’s read. It has nothing to do with the story; It’s simply self-congratulatory and annoying. When the book isn’t trying to convince you that its author is the most brilliant hipster to walk the earth, it’s trying to convince you he’s the next Hunter S. Thompson. Aug Stone will TELL you how much he’s been drinking, but god forbid he shows it. At one point, he’s had 12+ drinks, but recounts the night with the memory of someone who’s never had a drop of alcohol in his life. It seems quite difficult to write a spontaneous European bender like a Wikipedia article, but goddamn does Aug Stone manage to do just that. This book transcends eye-roll. My most frustrating read of 2023 by a country fucking mile.
August 6, 2022
I really didn't enjoy this - I guess I wanted to on some level, but the author constantly telling me it was great whilst never being able to show me that it was, well that was definitely a huge turn off. I've never read a book with such a punnishing internal commentary - so I guess in that sense it was unique.
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February 9, 2021An account of a ridiculous drunken escapade, read in an age where they're one more good thing locked firmly in the past. Written by a friend with whom I had more than a few drunken escapades, albeit never quite on this intercontinental scale – but then an ocean, among other things, intervened, even before the world broke altogether. Since its inception, it has also come to serve as a tribute to another friend of his, the co-lead here – someone I never really knew directly, but felt like I did at one remove. Oh, and I may hate 'personal journey' books, but quixotic quest books? Different matter altogether. So even as someone who would never claim the remotest objectivity in my reviews, I extra-specially can't here. Did they ever find Nick Cave's bar in Berlin? Did Nick Cave ever even have a bar in Berlin? Would it be a spoiler to suggest that maybe the real Nick Cave's bar was the inadvisable beverages they drank along the way? My lips are sealed. But I empathised a great deal with the Parisian story illustrating the realisation that "I'd have everything in front of me and then turn 180 degrees because I thought there must be more elsewhere too." And I think even the great Zen masters might envy the gnomic qualities of the line "Love is a two-way street but people in England drive on the other side of the road."
June 25, 2021
Well written, must for Nick Cave lovers and lovers of life
Was just a great read, read it in a day even with 3 kids running around! Loved it!! Wonder what Nick would think...
Was just a great read, read it in a day even with 3 kids running around! Loved it!! Wonder what Nick would think...
January 18, 2025
Reading this book, you find the author incredibly easy to hate on. A very privileged American with a seemingly limitless budget who just gallivants around Europe without a care in the world, not a word of language knowledge, and only intent on getting drunk and being as much of a nuisance as possible, makes you embarrassed to be of the USA. Maybe that's the point.
April 6, 2021
When Aug Stone and his best friend Andy heard that Nick Cave, the elusive Australian artist and frontman with The Bad Seeds, owned a bar in Berlin, they decided to get on a plane and find it. That’s it - that’s the story. Well that’s the premise of this book. What could possibly go wrong? A lot, apparently, but no spoilers: you’ll have to board that flight and follow our heroes on their picaresque adventure around Mitteleuropa, and be prepared to feel drunk by the end of it.
Despite its title, you don’t need to be a fan of the Australian artist to enjoy “Nick Cave’s Bar”. Part memoir, part travelogue, this short but dense book almost reads like a novel, with some beautifully evocative writing and laugh-out-loud moments poking through the absinthe-soaked haze of pop culture references and indie band names, all steeped in the author’s trademark earnestness and unashamedly betraying Stone’s undiluted, unfiltered, unadulterated, utterly unselfconscious passion for music and books.
A fast-paced trip down memory lane for ‘90s indie kids and a terrific read, “Nick Cave’s Bar” is an ode to youth and above all, a tribute to that rare kind of friendship that only happens once in a lifetime.
Despite its title, you don’t need to be a fan of the Australian artist to enjoy “Nick Cave’s Bar”. Part memoir, part travelogue, this short but dense book almost reads like a novel, with some beautifully evocative writing and laugh-out-loud moments poking through the absinthe-soaked haze of pop culture references and indie band names, all steeped in the author’s trademark earnestness and unashamedly betraying Stone’s undiluted, unfiltered, unadulterated, utterly unselfconscious passion for music and books.
A fast-paced trip down memory lane for ‘90s indie kids and a terrific read, “Nick Cave’s Bar” is an ode to youth and above all, a tribute to that rare kind of friendship that only happens once in a lifetime.
November 15, 2023
I’m not really sure what to think of this memoir. Didn’t hate it. Didn’t love it.
But I’m not sure the book was meant for me. It felt personal like it was meant for a group of friends, which might be true when one reads the final post script. Reading this did remind me of a few stories I had from college when I would binge drink more than I would study. Waking up on Sunday trying to cure a hangover with a bagel egg and cheese sandwich from Mom’s trying to piece together the previous night with whomever I woke up with that morning.
I do find myself wondering if I’m going to have to adopt Nick Cave’s Bar as a for an unobtainable place/item . A place that, as the author points out, may never have existed in the first place.
But I’m not sure the book was meant for me. It felt personal like it was meant for a group of friends, which might be true when one reads the final post script. Reading this did remind me of a few stories I had from college when I would binge drink more than I would study. Waking up on Sunday trying to cure a hangover with a bagel egg and cheese sandwich from Mom’s trying to piece together the previous night with whomever I woke up with that morning.
I do find myself wondering if I’m going to have to adopt Nick Cave’s Bar as a for an unobtainable place/item . A place that, as the author points out, may never have existed in the first place.
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February 20, 2021An ode to the worst decade of anyone’s life: one’s 20s. A surreal journey of music, Russian authors, European football games, drinking, friendship, heartache, and of course— Nick Cave. Written by the very talented writer/comedian/musician/Renaissance Man, Aug Stone aka Young Southpaw. Here’s to hoping you reach the hallowed halls of Nick Cave’s Bar one of these days, bud.
March 17, 2021
Read it front to back in one sitting! Writer, comedian, and musician, Aug Stone, also known for his regular appearances on the Pynchon in Public podcast, narrates, with engaging prose, a rollercoaster journey of the self via music, literature, love, friendship, and one epic international drunken escapade. Highly recommend to anyone looking for a good read.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews