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Who's best: Lou Reed or John Cale?
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Sin Agog
Sin Agog
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Edited Apr 23, 2010, 22:59
Re: Who's best: Lou Reed or John Cale?
Apr 23, 2010, 22:20
Ooh, tasty question. I generally prefer Cale's solo work, and his attempt at punk/new wave with Sabotage/Live was arguably more convincing than Reed's Street Hassle (which I also love). There's also his uncanny knack for being at the right place at exactly the right time: producing Nico, The Stooges, Modern Lovers, Patti Smith etc. And the Dream Syndicate presaged a million '90s/'00s drone bands.

But the V.U. were so bionically cool that even the bands they influenced took their cast-off cool and made a valuable contribution to rock music in their own right; a Lou-less V.U. just wouldn't work. It was his glissando guitar style, his perfect journalistic lyrics and his restless need to constantly explore new directions with each new song (bands would mine whole careers out of individual Velvet tracks) that really made the V.U. come alive. Cale helped bring Lou's early demos into the future, but he'd probably have carved a nice career as an A&R man or something if not for the Velvets. Whereas Lou Reed was born to make rock music.

It's not really an either/or thing of course. Their Songs for Drella album shows they really mesh together when they can put their egos aside for a few minutes. I guess I haven't answered the question. I'll flip a coin: heads, Lou; tails, Cale.

Tails it is. I'm happy with that decision.

Here's what I think is one of his most beautiful cuts: Only Time Will Tell.
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Who's best: Lou Reed or John Cale? (Carlos)
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