What with the ubiquity of VU related noises going on at the moment and the unfaltering attention of garage-rock, it seems oddly fitting that May should see the release of John Cale’s new EP ‘JOHN CALE 5 TRACKS’ on EMI on May 26th.
The prelude to a new album released this autumn; Cale proves that old dogs can not only new tricks but they can juggle deliriously fragile trip-hop and dub bass to boot.
From his celebrated work with The Velvet Underground, to the music he has made as a solo artist, to a fairly impressive string of sittings as producer (Nico, The Stooges, Nick Drake, Patti Smith, Happy Mondays) Cale continues to steer his uncompromising vessel of mindfuck into new waters.
More sample-based than previous efforts and freeing Cale of the natural limitations of a not always perfect studio band, ‘5 Tracks’ is sepia toned shrink-wrap of disturbed, distorted voices, dub-reggae, cut n’paste lyrical snippets and eerily pretty melodies.
Whilst not as freakishly cut n’ paste or as edgy as DJ Shadow’s ‘The Private Press’, it does share that same oddly dark organic matter and attention to mood: disembodied guitar strings, clanking industrial bells, muffled keys, lush but melancholic string sections and a world populated by ugly, half-formed souls. Creepy, off-key but utterly, utterly charming.
Balanced by the swaggering dub reggae of opening tracks, ‘Verses’ and ‘Waiting For Blonde’ and the swirling gentle ‘Kashmir’ of stand out tracks ‘E is Missing’ and the mournful and Gabrielesque, ‘Wilderness Approaching’, it may not be perfect in itself, but it is a perfect little portent of what John Cale still intends to achieve with his work.
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