Timeline: 1972
The Bataclan gig with Lou Reed and Nico
On January 29 Lou Reed is scheduled to perform in the small club The Bataclan in Paris. He is joined on stage by Nico and John Cale, who performs The Biggest, Loudest, Hairiest Group of All and Empty Bottles, two tracks that never make it on to one of his studio albums.
Various bootlegs of this gig survive. An official release sees the light of day in 2003. The show was filmed by French TV.
There were some talks to repeat the performance in London, but Reed was not interested.
Dixieland And Dixie / The Biggest, Loudest, Hairiest Group of All
Dixieland And Dixie and The Biggest, Loudest, Hairiest Group of All are recorded for a single to fulfill a contractual obligation for CBS. Dixieland And Dixie can be found on the Seducing Down The Door compilation. The single itself was never released and the studio version of The Biggest, Loudest, Hairiest Group of All never sees the day.
Producing The Modern Lovers
In April he produces demos sessions in Los Angeles for Warner Brothers for The Modern Lovers, the group led by Velvet Underground freak Jonathan Richman. The recording sessions dragged on and started to fall apart;
"It was just rehearsed to death - that's not the way. I was picking at sores after a while... At the end, he didn't trust me and I don't know why, something happened, and that broke it with me. I thought: I don't why this is happening, but it's a painful. I'm going to leave ... It was shame, because I felt that there was such an innocence that was worth capturing, that was kind of unbelievable in a way."
The 1972 recordings were finally released in 1976, including tracks recorded with producer Allan Mason for A&M, who had helmed another demo session in April 1972. The Cale produced tracks are Roadrunner, Astral Plane, Old World, Pablo Picasso, She Cracked, and Someone I Care About.
"There was very little that was orthodox about Jonathan. Like his views on life, his views on music and art were much more from a childlike and dream-filled perspective, which allowed him to create his own special reality."
Tim Mitchell in his book There's Something About Jonathan - Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers:
Cale instructed the engineers on how to set up the microphones and treated Jonathan's vocals with reverb and high treble, reducing his natural nasality. Clarity was maintained throughout, even during the guitar/organ battles of the instrumental breaks - if Cale had produced the Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat it might have sounded like this.
Cale played the repetitive hammered piano part on Pablo Picasso. He covered it on his Helen Of Troy album. It is still a regular fixture at his concerts, often used as an encore.
The Modern Lovers original is included on the Conflict & Catalysis: Productions & Arrangements 1966-2006 compilation album (2012).
His mellotron part for Girlfriend was not used on the album. The label went the Allan Mason produced version of that song.
The Academy In Peril
The Academy In Peril is released in July. It is the first album on Reprise. Andy Warhol designed the cover. Future Rolling Stone Ron Wood, then a member of The Faces, plays slide guitar on The Philosopher. Legs Larry Smith of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band takes care of the narration of Legs Larry At Television Centre.
"I took three weeks in England to do The Academy In Peril, and it wasn't enough.
I spent a week at the Manor in England recording and after that I had the bare essentials of some pieces that I wrote down. I had to wait around for two weeks for the Royal Philharmonic, but I was pleased with the results. I had forgotten what it was like to work with musicians like that, who really need an authorative figure. I had to conduct the orchestra. The pieces were self-explanatory, but they needed someone to tell them where the beat was because there was no time signature on the music."
He wasn't too pleased about how the John Milton track came out:
"The results on John Milton are not entirely to my satisfaction because of the very low level of the cut. It's a long piano piece, the inspiration came to me after seeing a BBC tv Omnibus programme, I found Milton very interesting, what he did with language, his attitude to it-- very puritanical, very rigid.
The piece I have written is romantic, almost French impressionist. But the way it was recorded-- it was so soft. We were using this church in Cripplegate, London. But the orchestra hasn't go any presence.
It was really funny, you know, I used to be in an orchestra myself see, so I was a bit easy-going about the whole thing, like 'we'll try this...how about that' but I know with classical symphony orchestras what they are really at home with is authoritarian figures. I think it would be a totally different story if I was conducting Brahms, but because I was doing my own stuff, which was written very strangely, it was a bit difficult for them. But they did very well, I think the way the approached it was like they would approached Cage or something like that."
"Days of Steam" single
Days of Steam b/w Legs Larry At The Television Centre is released as single in the US and New Zealand.
"Intro" and "Days of Steam" on Burbank sampler
Two tracks from The Academy In Peril, Intro and Days of Steam, are included on the Warner Brothers Burbank compilation.
"Temper" outtake
Temper, an outtake from the recording sessions for The Academy In Peril, is released on the promotional 2LP compilation Troublemakers (Warner PRO A 857, 1980). Also released on the Seducing Down The Door compilation.
It is included in the expanded and remastered version of the album in 2024.
"Days of Steam" in "Heat" soundtrack
This movie, directed by Paul Morrissey and produced Andy Warhol, uses Days of Steam from his The Academy In Peril album on the soundtrack. Previously he had done the score for Women in Revolt in 1971.
Warhol does the cover of that album as a return favour.
Producing Jennifer Warnes
He produces the Jennifer album by American singer-songwriter Jennifer Warnes and guides her through her version of Empty Bottles.