The Good Son (studio album)
by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds bestography
The Good Son is ranked 6th best out of 30 albums by Nick Cave on BestEverAlbums.com.
The best album by Nick Cave is Skeleton Tree which is ranked number 379 in the list of all-time albums with a total rank score of 4,446.
(N.B. Bestographies include all albums by an artist (and their variations), but do not include albums ranked outside the top 100,000).
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The Good Son track list
The tracks on this album have an average rating of 82 out of 100 (all tracks have been rated).
Top-rated track as rated by BestEverAlbums.com members.
The Good Son rankings
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Norman BatesThe Good Son collection
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The Good Son ratings
Average Rating = (n ÷ (n + m)) × av + (m ÷ (n + m)) × AVwhere:
av = trimmed mean average rating an item has currently received.
n = number of ratings an item has currently received.
m = minimum number of ratings required for an item to appear in a 'top-rated' chart (currently 10).
AV = the site mean average rating.
Showing latest 5 ratings for this album. | Show all 405 ratings for this album.
| Rating | Date updated | Member | Album ratings | Avg. album rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ! | 12/05/2025 16:28 | Araldo | 1,469 | 80/100 |
| ! | 11/29/2025 02:01 |  Kingturtle | 7,441 | 73/100 |
| ! | 11/23/2025 21:56 | Exist-en-ciel | 4,098 | 70/100 |
| ! | 11/23/2025 08:11 | NYAndreas | 1,432 | 43/100 |
| ! | 09/06/2025 07:24 |  melisandre | 149 | 89/100 |
Rating metrics:
Outliers can be removed when calculating a mean average to dampen the effects of ratings outside the normal distribution. This figure is provided as the trimmed mean. A high standard deviation can be legitimate, but can sometimes indicate 'gaming' is occurring. Consider a simplified example* of an item receiving ratings of 100, 50, & 0. The mean average rating would be 50. However, ratings of 55, 50 & 45 could also result in the same average. The second average might be more trusted because there is more consensus around a particular rating (a lower deviation).
(*In practice, some albums can have several thousand ratings)
This album is rated in the top 2% of all albums on BestEverAlbums.com. This album has a Bayesian average rating of 79.0/100, a mean average of 78.1/100, and a trimmed mean (excluding outliers) of 79.2/100. The standard deviation for this album is 14.5.
The Good Son favourites
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The Good Son comments
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One of the less engaging Nick Cave albums in my opinion and I always found my attention never really being able to stay on the record. Despite this, there is still a high amount of quality on this album as there always is with Nick Cave. The song writing is fantastic and he is so good at making us think a little deeper and connect to his words. The vocal performance is very good as well with it really shining on the better songs such as The Ship Song, The Weeping Song and Lament. Where the album struggle is in the instrumentation which feels a bit repetitive and quite bland. It lacks experimentation and is mediocre for the majority of the run time. The sound really suffers due to this and it makes for a dull and lifeless experience. Overall, some great moments on here that are let down by the musical side of the record and its inability to remain consistent.
VictorVale 04/14/2021 22:11 | #268544
Belo e arrepiante ao mesmo tempo!
1st album by NC & TBS where I went, wow, that's something special. Still holds up today.
JulianR 09/04/2017 03:27 | #197219
pretty good music, though it can be a little inconsistent
LedZep 02/27/2017 18:03 | #186466
Not a skippable song! Beautiful
The Good Son is a very underrated album that has great songwriting as well as having a strong powerful atmosphere created through deep personal lyrics and great instrumentation
This was the most accessible Nick Cave album to date when it was released in 1990. It's still a dark record, but the music is now approaching a beauty you certainly wouldn't have expected a few years before. Opener, foi na cruz, is lovely, as is, the weeping song. The most beautiful track though is the brilliant, the ship song, one of Cave's greatest ballads. There's no weak songs here, and, Lucy, is a great closing track. It's amazing how Nick Cave can effortlessly move from one extreme to another, from, the tender prey, to this. A true genius, one of the greatest songwriters ever.
badseed 04/13/2015 03:35 | #139410
Perhaps the most calculated album, track by track, that they ever did.
Favorite tracks: "The Ship Song", "The Weeping Song"
NickVolos 11/24/2014 14:37 | #127858
As much a spiritual as a listening experience: its theme derived from the parable of the prodigal son, only this is about the good son, the one that stayed behind - as opposed to the prodigal one...
meccalecca 04/24/2014 22:01 | #109995
At the funeral, no one mourned him besides the unrecognizable stranger standing in the shadows.
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