John Cale & Terry Riley - Church Of Anthrax LP
Terry Riley (piano, organ, soprano saxophone) & John Cale (bass, harpsichord, piano, guitar, viola, organ) collaborated on this one-off album, released in 1970. At this time, rock music was a serious movement, removed from the joke it once was, quite unaware of the joke it would eventually become, and things like this sometimes happened. Cale, classically trained on the viola, must have been pretty pleased to get a shot to record with the '60s king of minimalist pulse, Terry Riley. The album features 4 collaborative tracks between the two; while maybe not earth-shattering, they are quite fine for horizontal home listening pleasure at just about any hour of the day. Instrumental jams, mixing the styles of the two players pretty evenly (if you're vaguely awake, you can imagine this easily). The fifth track is a psychedelic pop masterpiece by Cale, "The Soul of Patrick Lee." Exactly why this track is included here has never been adequately explained, but it is about as beautiful as music in song form can get. 180 gram exact repro reissue.