John Cale 8: Guts and The Island Years

By 1977 John Cale was the definition of a cult figure, but he was gaining notice as a daring live performer, whether beheading chickens or inspiring Jason Voorhees by wearing a hockey mask onstage. This was likely the reason why his label decided to release the Guts compilation. Put together by soon-to-be-legendary A&R man Howard Thompson, it focused on Cale’s more aggressive recordings. (The back cover also kindly listed every musician who had played on them.)

For collectors, it offered quite a bit. After opening with the “title track”, “Mary Lou” was a rockin’ outtake from Helen Of Troy, then three more songs are included from that non-U.S. album, including the suddenly rare “Leaving It All Up To You”. Side two is split between tracks from Fear (the title track being the most comparatively quiet part of the album, until its end, of course) and Slow Dazzle. All together it was listenable, and certainly very representative, if a little constricted.

Fast forward to 1996, when Cale was more respected as an elder statesman and an inductee into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame with the Velvet Underground. The Island label had already done a nice job anthologizing many of their artists, and while they could have reissued his albums individually with bonus tracks, they made the smart economic move to maximize disc length with The Island Years, which fit all three albums onto two CDs—although “The Jeweller” was shorter for some reason—fleshed out with outtakes and rarities in context. The lovely “Sylvia Said” is a remix of a B-side, and very much along the lines of the poppier songs on Vintage Violence and Paris 1919. So too are “All I Want Is You” and “Bamboo Floor”, which would have stuck out on Slow Dazzle. Ensuring “Leaving It All Up To You” stays in context, the edgy “You & Me” and “Mary Lou” bookend “Coral Moon”. All together, a very busy two years. (Rhino’s 1994 Seducing Down The Door compilation sampled the same period but within the context of the rest of his solo career, up to his 1990 collaborations with Lou Reed and Brian Eno, so this was certainly preferred.)

John Cale Guts (1977)—3
John Cale The Island Years (1996)—3