In the early 1960s, the young Welshman Cale received a grant to study at the Boston Conservatory. Once overseas he met both composer John Cage and Lou Reed, and it is Cales avant-garde and minimalist influences that make The Velvet Underground's debut so special. Along with his dark voice and mostly morbid textual subjects, his subsequent solo albums were also characterized by a great urge to
… experiment, be they classically tinted albums like Paris 1919 or The Falkland Suite, or rock records like Fear and Slow Dazzle. At blackAcetate he was inspired by r & b producers such as Neptunes and Dr. Dre. For Cale fans that is, on paper, a bit of a shock but in practice these fresh influences mainly lead to a new inspiration with which multi-instrumentalist Cale harks back to the rock days of the aforementioned Fear in terms of atmosphere. Claustrophobic and dark rock, driven by (electronic) drones but also a lot of old-fashioned jerking guitars. (MR)more
