B-side "Little Empty Boat" Format CD single, 7" | Released 27 January 1997 Label Mute Records | |
Recorded 1996 at Sarm West and Abbey Road Studios, London, United Kingdom Genre Alternative rock, Piano rock | ||
"Into My Arms" is a song written by Nick Cave, and released as the first single from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' tenth studio album The Boatman's Call in 1997. The single, released on 27 January 1997, was pressed on 7" vinyl, as well as a standard CD single. A promotional music video for the song was also recorded.
Contents
Background and history
The song takes the form of a love ballad, with a piano and an acoustic bass as the sole instruments used. Music journalist and critic Toby Creswell included "Into My Arms" in his book 1001 Songs: The Great Songs of All Time and the Artists, Stories and Secrets Behind Them, in which he attributed the song's melancholic lyrics to the break-up of Cave's long-term relationship with Viviane Carneiro and his subsequent brief relationship and break-up with English musician PJ Harvey. In Cave's lecture "The Secret Life of the Love Song" to the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, he counts the song among those he is most proud of having written.
Cave performed the song at the funeral of his friend, INXS singer Michael Hutchence, but requested the cameras recording the service be switched off as he performed.
Track listing
UK CD single (Mute Records, CD MUTE 192)
- "Into My Arms" – 4:15
- "Little Empty Boat" – 4:25
- "Right Now I'm A-Roaming" – 4:21
UK 7" single (Mute Records, MUTE 192)
- "Into My Arms" – 4:15
- "Little Empty Boat" – 4:25
Music video
The song's music video was directed by British director Jonathan Glazer. In an interview on the DVD The Work of Director Jonathan Glazer, Nick Cave praised the video as well-produced, but said he considered it a poor fit with the song as the video's depressing imagery overrode the melancholic optimism Cave had intended the song to convey.
Chart positions
The song was also nominated for Single of the Year at the 1997 ARIA Awards, and came No. 18 in the Triple J Hottest 100 of that year. It was No. 84 in the 1998 Hottest 100 of All Time, and No. 36 in the 2009 Hottest 100 of All Time.
Other appearances in popular media
"Into My Arms" featured in the films About Time (2013), Gettin' Square (2003), Zero Effect (1998), the television film On the Beach (2000), and He Died with a Felafel in His Hand (2001). It has also appeared in The L Word episode "Luck, Next Time", series 4, episode 7 of British teen drama Skins, series 1, episode 5 of the Australian detective show City Homicide, and John Patrick Shanley's 2012 play Storefront Church.