Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus is the thirteenth studio album by the Australian alternative rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, released on 20 September 2004 on Mute Records. It is a double album of seventeen songs. History The album was produced by Nick Launay at Studio Ferber in Paris in March–April 2004 and Nick Cave used The Bad Seeds line up of Mick Harvey, Thomas Wydler, Martyn Casey, Conway Savage, Jim Sclavunos, Warren Ellis, and James Johnston. It was the first album by the group for which Blixa Bargeld did not perform – English guitarist and organist Johnston, of the group Gallon Drunk, replaced Bargeld. Cave decided to split drumming duties for the two parts, with Sclavunos on Abattoir Blues and Wydler on The Lyre of Orpheus. According to Launay, the whole album was completed in twelve days. The album's release was supported by the Abattoir Blues Tour, which travelled through Europe from 2 November to 5 December. In January 2007 a double live album and DVD was issued as The Abattoir Blues Tour. Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheuss last track, "O Children", was featured in the 2010 film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1, and the song is referenced as an achievement in Lego Harry Potter: Years 5–7. In March 2005, to complement the success of the double album, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds released B-Sides & Rarities, a three-disc, 56-track collection of B-sides, rarities, and tracks that had appeared on film soundtracks. Critical reception Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus holds a score of 88 out of 100 from Metacritic, indicating "universal acclaim". Susan Carpenter of the Los Angeles Times described the album as "a bounty of gothic rock" and noted that "the more driving, menacing numbers have been separated from the slow and scurrilous in a double album that is not two-halves of a whole so much as two distinct records released simultaneously and in one package." Thom Jurek of AllMusic described Abattoir Blues as "a rock & roll record... a pathos-drenched, volume-cranked rocker, full of crunch, punishment – and taste" and The Lyre of Orpheus as "a much quieter, more elegant affair... more consciously restrained, its attention to craft and theatrical flair more prevalent.". Greg Simpson of Punknews.org said that Abattoir Blues "is very bluesy indeed, a rock and roll album with many angry songs