On 20th March, John Cale graced his presence in Nottingham to put on a staggering showcase of his artistic craft. Elias Serghi reviews.
With his pockets filled with culture shifts, John Cale has wealth in composition that I couldn’t even fathom while sitting right in front of him. We all know and love his multi-instrumentalism on The Velvet Underground and Nico. I also love his 1973 pot of gold Paris 1919. However, I don’t see a lot of recognition for the fact that Bauhaus’ Peter Murphy cited Nico’s The Marble Index as “the first truly Gothic album”. Cale’s brains also smothered across that grey landscape of a record, I realised I was basically watching the inventor of Gothic rock on stage. Is that a crazy statement to make? Since I read that quote, I believed it, because his contribution to Nico’s Desertshore has never quite released me from an impact since I first heard it.
There were no bats flying across his show at The Nottingham Playhouse though. It was a set glistening very bright for some of his most ‘pop’ productions. Three narrow curtains were draped behind Cale and his band to project very colourful visuals while you could hear every instrument being played.
The band opened with his recent hit Shark-Shark, the only time Cale played the guitar like a shy frontman in a local band - all of his concentration in the chords. He then resided at his keyboard for the rest of the show. His first sitting played the psychedelic scurry of fast up-and-down notes from Captain Hook, enhanced by very strong guitar riffs as a grand introduction to the classic The Endless Plain of Fortune. As a four-man band, they managed to keep it as orchestral as the studio recording, still sounding as coming-of-age as when he composed it at 31.
My attention peaked once he began his vastly sorrowful cover of Elvis Presley’s Heartbreak Hotel. The lighting dimmed to a dark red and the sound became gruesome, like the hotel was the location of a horror plot. The bassist began to gently scrape his strings with a violin bow until we are actually taken back to Cale’s Avant-Garde legacy. Just a quick reminder of the artist he is at heart and reputation before singing politely again for slower and breezier numbers like Set Me Free and Rosegarden Funeral of Sores.
The rest of his set fluctuated between covers and originals. He played his sweet and sophisticated score for Dylan Thomas’ poem Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night. Surrounding his 2023 sonic journey, Out Your Window, he proposed a tribute to his innovative sidekick Nico. Three differently-coloured Andy Warhol style images of her face watched over the band as they played the mournful ballad Moonstruck (Nico’s Song), later on having us bow our heads down for a cover of her 1968 hypnotic terror Frozen Warnings. I didn’t recognise it at first for its reinterpreted softness, so they calmed me down before I could get a bit vocal with excitement. The screechy violin patterns were replaced with a much more stretched-out trodding of riffs and keys, which sounded a lot more comforting. He then concluded the set with his deep cut Villa Albani.
After thanking the crowd for sitting so well behaved and walking off stage, everyone began to clap their hands red for the encore. The lights turned back on and people were fooled, getting up to leave through the side door… until the first few bangs of The Velvet Underground’s I’m Waiting For The Man called everyone back to their seats. Everyone rushed back into the room, and the ushers gave up on making us put our phones away for the fact people were hearing a song from this album live in 2025. It sounded very updated yet just as classic, proving John Cale has still got it in 2025.
Elias Serghi
Edited by Alice Beard
Images courtesy of John Cale on Facebook
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