Nick Cave and Warren Ellis have announced a new seven-inch release titled ‘Grief’, based on a letter sent to Cave’s Red Hand Files website.

The release contains two songs, ‘Letter To Cynthia’ and ‘Song For Cynthia’. The former was written by Cave with music by Ellis, and the latter was composed and recorded as a duo.

The music, available for purchase here, is inspired by a question a fan called Cynthia sent to The Red Hand Files, where Cave responds to letters from his audience.

“I have experienced the death of my father, my sister, and my first love in the past few years and feel that I have some communication with them, mostly through dreams,” she wrote in October 2018. “They are helping me.”

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Referring to the death of Cave’s teenage son in 2015, she continued: “Are you and Susie feeling that your son Arthur is with you and communicating in some way?”

In a new statement, Cave said: “My reply was the first time I was able to articulate my own contradictory feelings of grief. Letters like Cynthia’s have helped bring me and many other back to the world.”

The two tracks were recorded in November 2020 at Soundtree Studios in London. “They are beautiful pieces and I hope you like them,” Cave continued.

Cave and longterm collaborator and Bad Seeds bandmate Ellis surprised fans with the release of their first studio album as a duo when ‘Carnage’ arrived to critical acclaim last month.

Last month Cave revealed that he and Ellis have recorded a live film featuring songs from the record alongside 2019 Bad Seeds album ‘Ghosteen‘ – directed by Andrew Dominik, who made the documentary One More Time With Feeling about the making of 2016 record ‘Skeleton Tree’.