Kiwi baits Nick Cave fans with clueless selfie

  • 19/01/2017
James Malcolm and Nick Cave
James Malcolm and Nick Cave (Twitter.com)

A Kiwi comedian has made international headlines by taking a selfie with Nick Cave - then asking Twitter who he is.

James Malcolm, 21, is a Billy T Award nominated comedian who describes himself on Twitter as a "wannabe gay icon" and "the Taylor Swift of New Zealand comedy".

Yesterday he managed to get into close proximity to the Aussie goth crooner at Wellington Airport, but felt left out not knowing who he was as fans excitedly got the man's signature.

"Does anyone know who this is? People keep asking him to sign their t shirt," Malcolm posted on Twitter alongside two different photos of himself and Cave.

Sure enough, hundreds of replies started to pile up, ranging from helpful straight answers to weird joke responses to upset Cave fans.

"People were disgusted with me for not knowing who Nick Cave is, but I'm pretty used to that sort of thing," says Malcolm.

"I'm an effeminate gay kid who has always been really into musicians like Miley Cyrus and Selena Gomez, so I'm pretty used to people being underwhelmed and disgusted in my music taste."

One chap who seems particularly self-serious seemed bothered by Malcolm's photo, then also bothered that he referred to Cave as a celebrity.

James Malcolm Twitter

Among those tweeting about Malcom's photo was filmmaker and son of David Bowie, Duncan Jones.

"I'm so embarrassed to say this but a lot of the joke responses, I don't get who those people are either," says Malcolm.

"But my favourite response was that [Cave] was Lenny from The Simpsons."

Malcolm is a Dunedin-born, Wellington-raised comedian who now spends his time between Auckland and Wellington.

His Cave tweets have become the basis for stories on the BBC, NME, NY Mag and Consequence of Sound, among others.

Cave and his band the Bad Seeds played shows in Wellington on Tuesday and Auckland on Wednesday, featuring material from his latest album Skeleton Tree.

Newshub.