Lou Reed vs. John Cale poll - (solo careers only)

Your prose is supple, your defenses well-sourced.

Fragments of a rainy season >>>>> anything by Lou (sorry, Lou. Love loads of your stuff, but it's not this good)

Reed has more albums I'd like to listen to -- and more bad albums to keep things interesting -- than Cale. No question that Cale rules the seventies: I'll take Fear and Slow Dazzle over Berlin and the perpetually overrated Transformer. But then with the release of The Blue Mask I like almost everything Reed done, Cale-Eno's Wrong Way Up an exception.

pretty skeptical about the 'bad albums keep things interesting' thing (outside of maybe MMM)

Lou's questionable taste in producers, subject matter, and guitar sounds is the kind of quirk I expect from a major artist.

wait, what does that leave to like?

No question that Cale rules the seventies: I'll take Fear and Slow Dazzle over Berlin and the perpetually overrated Transformer. But then with the release of The Blue Mask...

100% OTM.

If you haven't heard a Lou Reed album that works for you, keep trying. That's what I learned, in the end after many years.

John Cale has done some maginificent stuff, but Lou has a potential to connect with me like he's the blood running in my soul, etc.

Music For a New Society >>>> Reed's '80s albums.

Cale a better songwriter and certainly a superior melodicist in every way. Lou Reed makes more interesting albums every goddamn time.

Which btw is why I refuse to vote in this poll, which I'm sure is breaking everybody's heart

;_;

I love lots of solo Lou, but Cale's solo career was more interesting and with more highlights.

At the end of the day, I think I just hate Lou Reed.

You Cale fans are brutal.

Easy to be brutal when Cale suffers from an 'also-ran' rep - despite the fact that he was always the more interesting artist. (I don't think he has that problem on ILM.) But, for example, from his allmusic bio:

Cale has covered a wide territory on his solo albums without ever quite making his mark as a major artist. His songs and concepts are interesting, but ultimately he does not have the striking traditional rock talents of someone like, say, his old rival Lou Reed. The hooks aren't that sharp, the lyrics -- often dealing with the psychological and social dilemmas of late 20th-century life, in somewhat arty terms -- not as gripping.

voted cale for "fear" but must admit i don't really get "paris 1919"

i also really like all of the "inside the dream syndicate" stuff but that's not really cale solo nor do i think it's going to sway any votes on this thread

that amg bio is some straight up bullshit.

when I discovered Cale's Island period I was like "why have I wasted all these years listening to those crappy Lou Reed albums."

John Cale has done some maginificent stuff, but Lou has a potential to connect with me like he's the blood running in my soul, etc.

I love lots of solo Lou, but Cale's solo career was more interesting and with more highlights.

Uh.. OTM on both counts? Fuck.

I think I'll have to give this to Cale, who inches ahead by a nose b/c of the Nico collabs and the awesomeness that is the Eno/Cale LP.

not voting! they are pretty much equals to me.

Cale's autobiography "What's Welsh for Zen" is worth reading.

^ yes but good luck. for me the book is killed by some of the most over-bearing, cloying "graphic design" ever. i had to put it down. i doubt the designer ever listened to John Cale. untenable.

Cale on haircuts alone.

Okay, those Cale You Tube clips upthread are bone-chillingly good, I admit.

yes but good luck. for me the book is killed by some of the most over-bearing, cloying "graphic design" ever. i had to put it down. i doubt the designer ever listened to John Cale. untenable.

― nerve_pylon, Sunday, February 22, 2009 8:14 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

I agree completely, hopefully someday there will be a text-only version, it would stand on its own, I think.

so many great clips on youtube

That 1963 clip shredded me. Absolutely shredded me.

But if you don't like Velvet bootlegs than you cannot come over to my house.

I'm not going to let anyone over to my house who doesn't like Velvet boots. Sorry, the free booze ends here.

I'm not interested in going to your house if you voted for Lou Reed

prolly filled with meth-addicted tranny hookers anyway

Hahaha.

^^^^^

meth-addicted tranny hookers >>>>> heroin-addicted bike-riding humorless Teutonic harmonium-playing, uh, lady? I forgot my point. Oh, here it is: "Coney Island Baby" + "Wait", for example, are so lovely. But that was more than 30 years ago! John Cale, on the the other hand, (relatively) recently made the very entertaining Hobosapiens album. Fuck. Impossible. Lou Reed. Ha!

"Wait" is a lovely song, yes.

I'm sorry to crash this Cale party. I have this feeling that Cale will win this poll by miles, and then I'll just be standing out in the rain with good intentions. *weeps*

I voted Lou Reed, I love John Cale's solo stuff to pieces but did he write "Walk On the Wild Side"? No. "Kicks"? No (and that one he made several efforts to write). However, I saw him live I think three times and Lou only once, and Cale live >>>>>>> Lou live. Cale brought huge game live in the mid-eighties, like damn.

lol
http://www.theonion.com/content/from_print/area_man_seated_next_to_lou

I only recently really dug into Cale's solo work, after being totally blown away by Paris 1919. Cale definitely seems more consistent, and agree w/John that he's the more accomplished melodocist of the two... its weird, I had always assumed (without hearing anything) that Cale's solo work would be filled with aggressive experimentalism and noise and ugliness, and was shocked to discover his catalog actually jampacked with beautiful little pop vignettes, really sweetly orchestrated and meticulously arranged, in many cases. Also loads of funny songs/titles (personal fave: "The Man Who Couldn't Afford to Orgy").

BUT, I gotta go with Lou. Always frustrating, frequently bafflingly shitty, but his highs are SO high. Coney Island Baby and the third VU album have maintained such a major place in my listening library since I was a teenager that its impossible for me to shortchange the hold that Reed's best moments have over me.

Cale on haircuts alone.

― bendy, den 22 februari 2009 20:37 (4 days ago) Bookmark
he's taught me so much.
and i think i might even consider his highs higher than lou's. if this was about VU though it would be harder

non-Cale VU weighs this heavily in Lou's favor, methinks. Although I guess it isn't really fair to consider those Lou Reed solo albums

john cale is a great songwriter but I honestly don't find that many of his albums very compelling past Fear.

non-Cale VU weighs this heavily in Lou's favor

SOLO CAREER ONLY

yeah yeah, I voted Lou anyway based on Coney Island Baby, Transformer, and Street Hassle

obv as artists it makes more sense to compare everything they've done

but I knew that VU-work would make a cheap and easy mental tie-breaker (FOR THE WRONG SIDE)

potential to be remixed into something amazing:

My god - he sounds like Bill Withers.

*IS TRYING to sound like Withers

PS if anyone wants to start posting awesome solo lou reed videos GO FOR IT

there is surprisingly little live footage of Reed from the 70s

altho his hilarious interview from Australia ('74?) is all over the place

also, the melodies.

I voted Cale because "Paris 1919" is as close as I'm ever going to get to a favorite single song. It's total magic for me, inexhaustible pleasure. Saw an amazing solo performance around 1989 too. I find both of their album output spotty, but Cale has so many highs and even Reed's highs don't do much for me. I have a hard time fathoming Reed's downfall after the VU, but his smugness gets overwhelming by the late 70s. It's like he declared himself NYC's ambassador to the hinterlands, whereas his VU songwriting simply relishes NYC with goofy wonder. "Put jelly on your shoulder" works for me, but "You hit me with a flower" does not. "Whiplash girl child in the dark" works, "Shaved her leg and then he was a she" does not.

I can sum up my feelings about Lou Reed with a single word: "Asshole." Literally, I can't get past it with him -- this notion that the guy making the music is just an insufferable jerk.

On the other hand, Cale is one of my favorite artists, period. I get why not everyone would dig him—I remember a guy doing a lethal parody of that performance of "Frozen Warnings" posted above and just crying it was so spot-on—but as a conservatory-trained musician who also fell in love with the Beach Boys, I can just completely identify.

Also, forget this "peaks and valleys" crap w/ Cale. Vintage Violence, Paris 1919, The Island trilogy, Sabotage Live, Music for a New Society, etc. -- the guy's career is absolutely loaded with highlights and probably more consistent than all but a handful of artists. And barring Robert Wyatt, I can't think of too many people who made a record as vibrant as Hobosapiens at sixty.

I can sum up my feelings about Lou Reed with a single word: "Asshole." Literally, I can't get past it with him -- this notion that the guy making the music is just an insufferable jer

Which is all the more remarkable that the man wrote "The Kids," "Billy," "Legendary Hearts," "New Sensations," and "Halloween Parade."

"You hit me with a flower"

this line was written by Andy Warhol - the song "Vicious" was his idea and I think the whole line "Vicious, you hit me with a flower" was Andy's.

I don't think Lou Reed's assholeness takes away from his music. (Nor do I think assholes making pretty art is particularly exceptional.)

(though it might be why he's released so many half-assed albums, so I guess it takes away from his music in that sense)

I'm still working my way through the Cale discography, out of sheer dogged fascination. Like Reed, I think he has a lot of albums that strike me as boring or dry, but the times when he gets it right are such high peaks that they compel me to keep digging. I've played Paris 1919 twice, now, and I'm rather puzzled by it. I get the feeling there are great melodies there, real nice sing-able melodies I could really enjoy if I got to know them well enough, but from a first glance, there's something rather rote, rinky-dink and cutesy about it all that fails to compel me to listen again just now. It's just not really the kind of style I want from him, even though I'd wager Jack The Ripper could be said to be in the same style, but somehow better. I'd rather Cale be totally crazy and off-the-hook or slow and solemn or something, even if he fails at it.

In other news, I've just absolutely flipped my lid over the Eno version of "The Soul Of Carmen Miranda" because god, if that isn't Eno at his near-best...so I'm gonna try that album Words For The Dying, next.

Jury's out on Music For A New Society. Tried it a year ago, deleted it, now trying again. Decided there were a few keepers in that spotty album. Will listen again and dig them out.

Honi Soit is another one I tried last year and subsequently deleted and am going to try again soon.

Oh also! I'm actually gonna give Church of Anthrax a listen! Looking forward to that.

I love The Soul of Carmen Miranda, but I actually don't like what Eno does to it. Did you listen to the youtube clip of it upthread w/ the steel guitar? Incredible.

Yes, well that's what got me interested in the song and made me look it up, was that video. Nothing wrong with that version at all. One of the things that I think Cale has on Reed for me is the gorgeous piano playing he does sometimes, because I'm just a sucker for piano in a way I'll never ever be for guitar. This is really evident on Songs For Drella, but I don't really wish to choose a side between them on that album because it would absolutley break my heart in two. They both did a fantastic job on that.

Is there another version of "Soul Of Carmen Miranda" released on something else or is this You Tube video the only place I can get this version?

I'm gonna try Fragments, too. That's definitely on my plate up next.

I don't think it's been released on any other album.

Cannot believe you haven't heard Fragments.

Like stop bothering with the other stuff and go listen to that now.

Haha! Okay...but I have to wait for it to download, thanks! ;)

Also, I was re-reading the first half of this thread or so last night from back at the 2nd March (my birthday btw...and Lou Reed's) and it struck me that John D. had some really LOL funny stuff to say on this thread and in general, I just love this thread, I adore that all these people have contributed to debating these two men, both of which suddenly became more important to me personally in the last year than they had ever, ever been in the oh...25 years that I'd been aware of them.

I guess John D. is on tour now? He hasn't exactly been around lately on ILX as far as I know.

But yeah I do have one question for you, iatee, in all honesty. Have you heard Lou Reed's song The Blue Mask? Not the album, but the song. I don't even want to look it up on You Tube because I think a visual would really ruin it. It needs to be heard with no visuals. That song above all other Reed things is what keeps Cale in a #2 position at this point for me. It's an absolute catharsis of the soul.

Yeah his site says he is. I liked this thread too. Fwiw I listened to a *lot* of Lou Reed while posting and grew an appreciation for Coney Island Baby.

Yeah I've heard the whole album. It doesn't really do much for me.

Oh alright then. My favourite Lou Reed album is actually Rock & Roll Heart, but Coney was a good start.

Thanks for listening.

Another cool thing about these guys, especially from the Bataclan perspective, is, I'd already had my Nico phase about ten years ago, so she's totally separate from them for me. Although I heard some instrumentation on Cale's Artificial Intelligence album recently that reminded me of that mid-80's "Camera Obscura" album Cale did with her and the book I read about her & Cale on tour with the band in the early-mid 80's. Fantastic book, btw. Songs They Never Play On The Radio Cale was painted as being an extreme alcoholic at the time of all this, and paranoid of government conspiracies and stuff. I don't know anything more except that I thought that was the worst Nico album, really boring.

Artifical Intelligence wasn't very good at all, I saved three songs from it on my iPod. I really like the SOUND of the keyboards on the first track. Takes me back to 1985 for sure. "Black Rose" was another one I saved, undeniably beautiful song, I think.

Yeah artificial intelligence is not great, but 'black rose' is and 'dying on the vine' REALLY is. You might have to hear the fragments version first though. As I said before, maybe his best song.

Here it is:

(lolz the 3rd version of that song I'm posting on this thread.)

where can i hear this "Soul Of Carmen Miranda" eno version?
cus i need to hear this

it's on words for the dying

xpost - iatee you're still here!

Sigh...it's on one of two things...(deep breath, because I'm trying to be calm and I adore it and you're going to make me play it again and swoon into oblivion so I can finally stop posting all over this board and boring everyone)

1) Words For The Dying album
or
2) some box set of Eno called "Eno Box II: Vocals"

Really, I'll be quiet and calm now. Tell me what you think of it. Eno sortof makes me have a crush on him every couple years, but I've already said this on other threads, it doesn't bear repeating. I'm well aware he's only about 70% as brilliant as he believes he is or people think he is, but that's more than enough sometimes.

and its eno singing it?
ok i need

and "I'd rather Cale be totally crazy and off-the-hook or slow and solemn or something, even if he fails at it."
= i dunno if you'll really dig Fragments

it has been proven that anything with Eno vocals i will love with all of my heart

no it's cale vocals w/ a very, very eno soundscape

awwww so let down
i still need to hunt it down, though
and i almost bought that album two days ago

kicking myself now

No, no, no, iatee/Face of Wolf!! WAIT!!

I hear Eno backing vocals in this! I swear!

Eno's like a little pixie in the forest when he sings! Bewitching, like Pan in the forest, I ADORE his voice. Not as much as Pete Townshend's maybe, but he's up there.

anyway I haven't given up on the BJ Cole version, iatee, I assure you. Will rip it very soon. Need to take a break from ILX now and clear my head.

oh yeah he supply some "oooooooo"s

supplies

this would be a good moment to talk about how good wrong way up is

Yes, he does the "oooos" doesn't he? I told you! It's him! God I feel that way when he comes in at the end of that James song "Sometimes"! God, Eno vocals at the end of a song by someone else, can you beat it?

only with Eno vocals on a song by himself!
but yeah, Eno "ooos" completely sells a song for me

Yeah, he should sing all the time. Do lots and lots of albums with his own vocals. But he doesn't do nearly enough.

http://www.jimdero.com/News2003/GreatOct5EnoCale.html

this came up while googling the song title. not meant to be an endorsement of (er...) jim dero, just some interesting background:

Tacked on to that album almost as an afterthought was a short, catchy throwaway called "The Soul of Carmen Miranda" that Eno and Cale wrote while fooling around in the studio. "It was kind of like ESP, the way it developed, and I was really encouraged," Cale told me at the time. "I never expected that Brian and I would work together on songs, so it was a surprise. I thought that if we could reproduce the circumstances, we could do the same thing for an album."

Eno fans had been asking for years when he would sing on album again -- the stacked harmony vocals on his pop albums was one of the highlights of those discs -- but he'd been more interested in creating instrumental landscapes. "If you look at the transition through my first three albums, you'll see that the vocals occupy less and less of a place on those records," he told me. "People always assume that the stuff with words is the good stuff, the stuff that sold a lot and that everyone liked, and the other ambient stuff was not so well-liked. In fact, the opposite is true. My most popular record is 'Music for Airports.'

"I like the way I sing, but I never really expected anyone else to like it," he said. "I think of my voice as a sort of precision instrument. It's like a very sharp pencil. But most of the voices that people seem to like, most of the people that get described as good singers, have these fantastic paint brushes and great palettes of color."

Nevertheless, inspired by the chance result of "The Soul of Carmen Miranda," Eno decided to sing again, and he invited Cale to spend at month at his home and studio in Woodbridge, England. Hypnotic, driving and ultramelodic songs such as "Lay My Love" (which would eventually be covered by Chicago's Poi Dog Pondering), "Spinning Away" and "One Word" came together in the studio as Eno created gently pulsing rhythm beds on the drum machine and played swirling synthesizer and odd guitar parts while Cale added regal piano, organ and viola. They both arranged the tasteful contributions of a handful of outside musicians (notably the string players who color several songs) and shared the vocal duties, Cale with his rich, resonant baritone and Eno with his dirty choir-boy tenor.

It's hard to take all that in, because I'm so deeply in love with it all.

Right now I'm trying to restrict myself to playing the Cale song "Where There's A Will There's A Way" over and over on repeat as many times as I can stand it because this song has BEWITCHED me for the last 2 weeks and I need to get it out of my system in some final way if I can so it will finally LEAVE ME ALONE at last. I declare, it is THE most perfect song Cale has ever done in his life, and I really need to close up shop with it, else it will haunt me every waking hour for the next three weeks at least.

Other than that, I decided that if Eno had ever even ENTERED THE ROOM while Cale & Reed were doing "Trouble With Classicists" for the Songs For Drella album then the entire universe would have exploded and I might have had three orgasms at one time.

iatee - I just got your email, but the problem is the ilx email system doesn't let you see the return address of the poster, so there's no way I could email you back. You are very kind, but I have already acquired the said musical John Cale material. I just have to put it on my iPod now. Thanks for your help.

Alright, I've finally ripped the BJ Cole version from You Tube to my iPod, thanks iatee. Say what ever you want about him, but Cale had a damn good haircut.

OH NO, Church of Anthrax, second track in - "The Hall of Mirrors In The Palace of Versailles", oh mercy of a godless sky this is the ultimate SHIT. THIS IS WHERE DIF JUZ GOT THEIR SOUND! Unfuckable with. What year was this? Holy hell. This can't be REAL. 1971 you say? 1971?????? Oh my god.

having given close listens to Fear, Helen of Troy, and Slow Dazzle over the past few weeks... I dunno these results just seem so wrong. I LOVE Paris 1919 and Church of Anthrax and a handful of tracks from various other albums but this dude is just NOT the songwriter or fascinating personality that Lou is.

will grant J0hn D's point that Cale is a better melodicist. but that isn't everything.

depends on the day for me, i still could go either way. though the fact that cale's paris 1919 guest vocalist tonight in LA is (wah wah) ben gibbard brings him down a notch today!

<em>I can sum up my feelings about Lou Reed with a single word: "Asshole." Literally, I can't get past it with him -- this notion that the guy making the music is just an insufferable jerk.</em>
Anybody who still thinks this is a reason Cale > Reed do yourself a favor and never read Cale's autobio.

yeah, not like cale isn't as egomaniacal as reed, or at least close. and man, if i only listened to people who i thought were nice guys/gals, i'd have a boring music collection.

Certainly worth a thread: Nice people who make great music?

Willie Nelson

Lou Reed wrote and recorded the song 'Street Hassle' - Lou Reed wins.

The Cale autobio made him an asshole? I missed that, just cemented him as more of a genius in my mind and a superior "all around guy" to Reed to boot. No contest, the results of this poll are right on IMO. Cale is an artist, Reed is a personality.

Merry Christmas! https://twitter.com/psychedelicmag/status/813036724490301441