When Lester Bangs jammed with John Cale
After spotting an advert in an issue of Rolling Stone requesting readers to send in their reviews, Lester Bangs began his career as a freelance music journalist. His first accepted piece was a scathing review of MC5’s newly released 1969 album Kick Out the Jams. Throughout the 1970s, Bangs continued writing, often severely criticising popular bands, such as Black Sabbath, who he referred to as “Cream clichés that sound like the musicians learned them out of a book, grinding on and on with dogged persistence.”
The journalist was fired from Rolling Stone in 1973 after “disrespecting musicians” such as Canned Heat. This didn’t stop Bangs, who had been named editor of Detroit-based rock publication Creem two years prior. During his time at the magazine, Bangs wrote extensively about bands that received little coverage in mainstream media, such as The Velvet Underground, Roxy Music, Blondie and Captain Beefheart.
Bangs had a massive influence on both alternative music and rock journalism, being one of the earliest writers to use to term ‘punk rock’. The writer was always ahead of the game, covering new scenes and artists before they exploded. He was a huge fan of Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground, championing them when few other critics did. One of the band’s founding members, John Cale, once discussed his admiration for Bangs, even though he found him to be a “scary individual.”
In Jim DeRogatis’ book Let It Blurt: The Life and Times of Lester Bangs, America’s Greatest Rock Critic, Cale shared, “I was bouncing around the walls, but he bounced around his own walls. Every time I spoke to him, it was a kind of easygoing conversation—a very rational sort of conversation. But when it ended up on the page, it was another story. It had a completely different edge to it that was spectacular. The ability of being able to creep inside and squirm around your head on the written page was really extraordinary. It was almost like he was trying to be a collaborator.”
In 1977, Bangs released his first single, ‘Let It Blurt/Live’, mixed by Cale, and the following year, the pair teamed up for a crazy night at New York’s iconic CBGBs venue. According to a CBGBs advert, Richard Hell and the Voidoids had played for three nights straight at the venue before Cale and Bangs tore up the stage on Sunday 17th September. Yet the night wasn’t even advertised as a Cale gig. Instead, the line-up consisted of punk/metal outfit The Corpse Grinders, which involved former members of the New York Dolls and the elusive Tom Carey Band.
Despite the mystery of the Tom Carey Band, it can be gleaned that the members had associations with either Cale or Bangs, as the pair accompanied them on stage. There is speculation that the music heard in the rare recording, which features Cale singing and Bangs “vocalising”, is all composed by Cale. However, it is highly likely it is somewhat of a jam session, despite evoking a Velvet Underground-esque sound. Little is known about the circumstances that led to the performance, and it’s a shame that Cale didn’t develop these tracks into officially recorded pieces – with or without Bang’s vocals.
