Courtesy: Mute Records

"Everyone wanted to work with her but it was like trying to trap lightning in a bottle" - Nick Cave writes on his Red Hand Files blog about his Birthday Party and Bad Seeds colleague Anita Lane, after the news of her death was published. Cave describes Lane as “the smartest and most talented of all of us, by far”, and chooses 'Stranger Than Kindness' as his favourite Seeds song. Cave describes how "at my kitchen table drawing things, she had a quickness of touch and a clear, light line full of humour, throwing each drawing away and starting another, charged with a rampant, unstable, fatal energy that would follow her all her life. My line, amateur and ponderous... It was both easy and terrifying to love her. Leaves a big crying space".

Australian musician Anita Lane, a flower of Melbourne 1980s post-punk scene, and the former member of The Bad Seeds and The Birthday Party, has died aged 62, Louder Than War reports. Lane co-wrote early Birthday Party tracks ‘A Dead Song’, ‘Dead Joe’ and ‘Kiss Me Black’, as well as Bad Seeds songs ‘From Her To Eternity’ and ‘Stranger Than Kindness’ with her then-boyfriend Nick Cave. Lane went on to have a long and distinguished career, working with the likes of Kid Congo Powers, Gudrun Gut and Einstürzende Neubauten. Lane also released a number of solo albums.