Timeline: 1977
European tour with Patti Smith cancelled - sharing the bill with Cheap Trick
After a bunch of dates in March in Europe a tour as support act for Patti Smith are cancelled. She danced off-stage and feel 15 feet at a show in Tampa, Florida on January 23rd, breaking several neck vertebrae. Cale and his band played club shows in California instead. Up and coming power-pop band Cheap Trick are the support act during a 3-night stand (March 17-19) at the Starwood Club in Hollywood. Not exactly a match made in heaven.
Croydon Chicken incident
Cale was playing The Greyhound in Croydon, UK on April 24. During Heartbreak Hotel a dead chicken was introduced on stage which Cale decapitated with a meat cleaver. Two of his bandmembers, both vegetarians, were not amused. They walked.
This stunt haunts him until this day, but he did not kill a chicken on stage. A roadie did it before the show. Backstage.
"I am singing, 'We could be so lonely,' swinging the chicken around by its feet, nobody in the audience knowing it was dead, 'we could be so –' Twhok! I decapitated it and threw the body into the slam dancers at the front of the stage, and I threw the head past them. It landed in somebody's Pimm's."
Dirty Ass Rock 'n' Roll jukebox single
No singles were released to promote the Slow Dazzle album when it was released. Island however does a belated coupling of Heartbreak Hotel and Heartbreak Hotel in France aimed at jukebox distribution.
Dancer With Bruised Knees
Plays organ on the title track of Dancer With Bruised Knees, an album by Canadian singer-songwriters duo Kate & Anne McGarrigle. Plays marimba on Be My Baby.
Keyboards for Julie Covington
Plays keyboards on the Only Women Bleed single, a cover of the Alice Cooper song by English singer Julie Covington. Cooper loved it and sent her a complimentary telegram. The single is included on the expanded CD-reissue in 2009 of her self-titled debut album from a 1978 on which Cale performs on four songs. The reissue was renamed Julie Covington ... plus.
Chris Spedding & Pat Donaldson encore in London
Former band members guitarist Chris Spedding and bass player Pat Donaldson join Cale on stage at the Roundhouse in London on April 10 for the encore of Baby, What You Want Me To Do and I'm Waiting For The Man. The Clash were supposed to be playing as well - they were the second act on the bill - but they bailed.
Guts
Release of Guts, the first best of album, with tracks from Fear, Slow Dazzle and Helen of Troy, the three albums he made for Island.
Includes the previously unreleased Mary Lou and Leaving It Up to You, which was deleted from Helen Of Troy. After shipping the first pressings Island Records replaced the track with Coral Moon, because it mentioned Sharon Tate, wife of film director Roman Polanksi, who was killed in 1969 by the Charles Manson gang.
Harvey Gold covers "Close Watch"
Harvey Gold - guitarist, bassist, and keyboardist for the American experimental rock and new wave band Tin Huey - covers Close Watch. It is the A-side of his 7" solo single Experiments.
Animal Justice
Releases his first EP, Animal Justice, in September with three tracks: Memphis, Chickenshit and Hedda Gabler. Released as a 7" 33rpm and 12" 45rpm.
Chickenshit is a putdown for the band members who walked off stage after the Croydon incident. Backup vocals by his lover/manager Jane Friedman.
Memphis and Hedda Gabler were re-released on Seducing Down The Door and the CD re-issue of Sabotage/Live, which also includes Chickenshit.
Producing the punks
Punk takes off in a big way in the UK. The new kids on the block are in awe of the fact that Cale is a founding member of The Velvet Underground and that he has produced the first albums by Patti Smith (1975) and The Stooges (1969). He is considered to be cool enough to help them out to commit their angry sounds to vinyl.
Step-Forward Records label co-owner Miles Copeland had already hooked him up with The Police in 1976, but there was no chemistry and the sessions were aborted.
Cale produced three bands:
- Packet of Three (Cat On A Wall b/w Night Ride + Back Track), an EP by London based band Squeeze (the EP's title comes from the UK term for a standard package of condoms). He would also produce their self-titled album, released in 1978;
- I Don't Wanna b/w Red London/Ulster, a single by Hersham based band Sham 69;
- I Need Nothing b/w Electrocutioner, a single by London based band Menace.
(Thanks to Laurent Cobac <lcobac@yahoo.com> for the cover scan)
Jamming with Ian Hunter, Mick Ronson and Corky Laing
Cale foots the bill for a workshop album recorded at the Bearsville Studios in Woodstock, NY with Mick Ronson, Ian Hunter and drummer Corky Laing. Ronson:
"By late 1977, Ian and Corky came together and decided to give it another go. Ian suggested bringing Mick Ronson in, and the trio began rehearsing and hanging out together. John Cale was recording in an adjacent studio one night, so Mick suggested dropping in to see him. At Cale's urging, the group decided spontaneously to record an album, so the four - Hunter, Ronson, Laing, and Cale - recorded about an hours' worth of material on Cale's dime."
Ian Hunter:
"When I worked with Cale, that was great, really great. He brings something into a room, an aura. We did an album once, a workshop album. It was with Corky Laing and Mick Ronson. It was some great stuff, all the lyrics were stream of consciousness. Apparently, I'm one of the few people who can do that, if I get excited enough. I can reel off words without writing them down. They just come. We had it going for two nights, and it was great."