Music for a New Society album cover
Music for a New Society

John Cale

1982
Island Records

This 1982 title is one of my favorite Cale collisions, in that he is caught between some classic Eighties coldness, awash in digital reverb, and some of his most orotund and nutty singing choices. The soft rock electric piano and gated drum machines live in an odd space next to Cale’s philosophical man-in-the-tower serenading, and this one cements Cale’s reputation as the guy who makes albums that don’t sound like other people’s albums, not even for a second. The endless digital reverb, to reiterate, is really fucking weird. Very ballads inside an abandoned house vibes here.

Sasha Frere-Jones

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