John Cale - M:FANS

I know embarrassingly little about John Cale, Velvet Underground co-founder and Lou Reed collaborator, but this mesmerising melting pot is pushing me to investigate further. This is a reboot of his 1982 album Music For A New Society, which was considered a masterpiece by critics. As with any very creative artist, I’m out of my depth with his intentions, but the whole piece is a beautiful, brave riot of noise and calm. It opens with a conversation between Cale and his Welsh mother, her singing Ar Lan Y Mor down the line; this was left off the original, much to his regret later. On If You were Still Around he would “hold you, shake you by the knees, blow hot air into both ears” before continuing to “tear into your fear, leave it hanging off you in long streamers”, this is a powerful grief-filled song, reprised at the end of the album with a choral version offering hope, or suggesting forgiveness. If someone fifty years younger made this, it would be Mercury nominated, so much ambition, skill, technique and heart is on show; gentle dreams segue into nightmarish teutonic electro rock, and edgy beats allow vocoder action to work on Thoughtless Kind, choirs and strings. I’m a bit in awe. This is what Scott Walker writing with Dangermouse might sound like, and that’s right up my boulevard of broken dreams. Really powerful; a huge talent still.