David Bowie
Put American actor Nicolas Cage and Australian musician Nick Cave in the same room, and it seems no one can tell the difference – at least that’s what the former has claimed in a recent interview.
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Cage (that’s the actor, not the musician) is currently promoting his recently-released film The Surfer, which was both filmed and set in Cave’s home country. Speaking to The Guardian, Cave responded to a reader’s question about a 2022 tall tale from Cave which recounts the pair apparently meeting based on their similar names.
“I don’t think there’s a day that goes by where I’m not mistaken for Nick Cave,” Cage explains. “People also say: ‘Hey, Nick, you were great in The Hunger,’ which is this great David Bowie movie.”
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Though Cage didn’t appear in Tony Scott’s 1983 film The Hunger (and neither did Cave), the actor turned his attention to an anecdote in which he claims to have met the musician.
“I do remember that Cave was very nice,” he continued. “We were at an animal sanctuary, I believe – I think Sealy Animal Hospital in Texas – and he was terrific. I said hello and wanted to shake his hand. I said: ‘Only one letter separates us – G. Nick Cave, Nick Cage.’”
Cage’s comments somewhat echo the 2022 story which Cave shared on his Red Hand Files website, responding to readers who respectively asked if Cave has ever met Cage, or added an “untrue component to a story to make it more interesting than it actually is.”
“People mix me up with Nicolas Cage all the time,” Cave recalled. “Like, I’ll be going through customs and the customs officer will look at my passport and say, ‘Happy to have you with us, Mr Cave. Loved you in Face/Off’. Or whatever. Sometimes it can be a bit of a pain in the neck, but you get used to it.”
Cave then continued with a lengthy tale about how he was apparently mistaken for Cage while purchasing a didgeridoo for his late son Arthur from the gift shop of the Healesville Sanctuary in his home state of Victoria. On their way home to Melbourne, Cave claims their meal at a local pub was interrupted by an apparent interaction with Cage.
“I follow the security guy into a small private room, adjacent to the main bar. Sitting there is Nicolas Cage,” Cave writes. “He is wearing a pork-pie hat and holding a didgeridoo. Nicolas Cage shouts, ‘Only one letter separates us!’ and leaps from his seat and eagerly pumps my hand. I’m pretty confused by all of this, but say, ‘It’s an honour to meet you, Mr Cage. Have you just been to Healesville Sanctuary?’ and he shouts, ‘Yes!’ and I say, ‘Well, me too.’”
Though it remains to be seen whether Cage’s own claims of mistaken identity are truthful (and for that matter, where the truth – if any – lies in Cave’s own story), Cage also used his interview with The Guardian to comment on the existence of Australian band Nicolas Cage Fighter.
“I think they’re terrific,” he explained. “Their songs are empowering. The lyrics are all about taking ownership of your mistakes, never being a victim, figuring out how you can fix your problems.”
Los Angeles-based alt-pop duo Magdalena Bay have paid tribute to David Bowie for their recent appearance on Like a Version, the long-running segment from Australian radio station triple j.
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Premiering on the morning of Friday, March 28 (Australian time), the pair – which comprises Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin – recorded their performance during a recent trip to Australia in early March. The two-song set saw them performing original track “Image” before focusing on Bowie’s 1980 single “Ashes to Ashes.”
First released as the lead single to Bowie’s 1980 album Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps), the single did not impact the Hot 100, though it gave Bowie his first U.K. chart-topper since 1969’s “Space Oddity.” The album, meanwhile, peaked at No. 12 on the Billboard 200 and was Bowie’s first in six years to top the chart in his home country.
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“It’s a great, kind of weird experimental pop song that I think we took a lot of inspiration from,” said Lewin in a post-performance interview. ”We’re always just kind of listening to it, it’s never really left our rotation of songs that we love,” added Tenenbaum.
“I drew a lot of influence from his ideas of being an artist and what it means to create art,” continued Tenenbaum. “I found [it] very inspiring as we were going into the creation of our latest album, Imaginal Disk.
“It’s tough, because when you love a song so much and you know what you love about it and then you also want make it your own a little bit, it’s like, ‘How much should you really mess with it?’”
Magdalena Bay’s cover was indeed preceded by a cut from latest album, Imaginal Disk, with second single “Image” also performed in the Like a Version studio. The track was voted in at No. 147 in triple j’s annual Hottest 100 countdown, and in December 2024 was chosen by Billboard staff as one of the 20 Pop Songs From 2024 That Deserved to Be Smashes.
Having first launched in 2004, the Like a Version series has gone from being a near-impromptu acoustic affair to featuring larger studio productions. Numerous artists have taken part over the past two decades, with the likes of Billie Eilish, Childish Gambino, Arctic Monkeys, and more reinventing classic tracks in the process.
Prom Pact is bringing 1980s glitz, perms, bright colors and ruffled dresses to 2023, and the film is also highlighting one of the boldest decades in its soundtrack.
The list of songs (listed in full below) features a mix of modern hits like Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy” and Imagine Dragons’ “Believer” with a slew of throwback classics like David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance,” Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” Billy Idol’s “Mony Mony” and even the Ghostbusters theme. The soundtrack also includes a number of covers from the cast, including the Dirty Dancing hit “I’ve Had the Time of My Life.”
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“There are so many songs I wanted to include,” the film’s director and executive producer Anya Adams tells Billboard of curating the perfect playlist for the film. “There’s not enough movie for the songs we wanted to use, but I wanted to bring in a multitude of different ’80s music. So not just be in one kind of genre. We’re using DJ EZ Rock and doing ‘It Takes Two,’ but we’re also using David Bowie and ‘Let’s Dance.’ It was hard to pick songs!”
She continued, “Some of the songs were written into the script and really worked with the scene, so we kept them. Some of them, we saw the scenes and we were like, ‘Oh, let’s bring in this song.’ So it’s been a kind of journey and everyone is really excited about the music because it does inspire such nostalgia and we’re so excited to introduce this music to this generation.”
Prom Pact follows high school senior Mandy Yang (Peyton Elizabeth Lee) and her best friend Ben (Milo Manheim) as they navigate prom season. The prom is ’80s-themed, and the BFF duo are surrounded by over-the-top Promposals, but Mandy has her goals set on getting into Harvard University. When she’s waitlisted from her dream school, Mandy plans to get accepted by becoming the tutor for the all-star jock Graham Lansing (Blake Draper), whose father is a powerful senator and Harvard alum.
See below for the full soundtrack, shared exclusively with Billboard, plus a featurette in which the cast and crew discuss the making of the ultimate ’80s prom in modern times. Prom Pact premieres March 30 on Disney Channel, before becoming available for streaming the next day on Disney+.
Soundtrack track list“Believer” – Imagine Dragons“Bad Guy” – Billie Eilish“Addicted to Love” – Robert Palmer“Old Time Rock & Roll” – Bob Seger“What Makes You Beautiful” – One Direction“Fall on Me” – Great Big World and Christina Aguilera“Let’s Dance” – David Bowie“The Promise” – When in Rome“Mony Mony” – Billy Idol“I Wanna Dance With Somebody” – Whitney Houston“Only You” – Yazoo“Coincidance” – Handsome DancerTheme from Ghostbusters
CoversPat Benatar’s “Love Is a Battlefield” – Milo Manheim and Peyton Elizabeth LeeSeal’s “Don’t Cry” – Alice LeeNazareth’s “Love Hurts” – Alice LeeBill Medley and Jennifer Warnes’ “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life”Men in Hats’ “The Safety Dance”
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