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Underground Rock Nick Cave By Gina Arnold When Cave played an acoustic show at the Palace of Fine Arts this spring, the Bohemian crowd pretty much lost its collective cool at his feet. Instead of watching quietly and barely applauding, they behaved as if they were at a Backstreet Boys concert, yelping, "I love you" and (figuratively, anyway) wetting their leather pants. Does Cave, a darkly humorous but somewhat scary presence on the music scene for almost 20 years, deserve such accolades? In a word, yes. The Australian former punk rocker is a cross between Jughead Jones and Elvis Presley, with a touch of Robert Johnson. He sings gloomy modern blues tunes about death and the devil, and he does so in a weirdly basso profundo voice that can, when it needs to, outshoot his loud and frightening East German-derived band, the Bad Seeds. September 21-22; 8pm both nights; the Warfield, San Francisco; $32.50/$25. Critics' Picks: Belle and Sebastian, Björk, Bridge School Benefit, Nick Cave, dredg CD Release, Bob Dylan, Janet Jackson, Ozma, Pledge of Allegiance Tour, ResFest2001, Sex Mob, SoFA Street Fair, Watcha Tour , Weezer Fall Music: A high performance guide to Bay Area concerts. Venue Finder: Auditoriums, halls, wineries and clubs. [ San Jose | Metroactive Central | Archives ]