Third time lucky for this show on John Cale's current tour, to promote his new album Mercy, actually happened, postponed twice due to Covid issues it was a relief that this actually took place, as now that John is 80 years old we have to be thankful he is still able to tour.
Also due to covid issues The London Palladium has been putting on lots of live music again rather than theatrical productions, so we get to sit and watch the show in this magnificent theatre that has some very fine acoustics too.
Opening the show was a young South African singer songwriter Manu Grace who follows in the footsteps of among others Beth Orton and Lucy Rose as female solo acts opening for John Cale in London over the years, she isn't anyway near as petrified as Lucy Rose was, but is also not as memorable as Beth Orton was.
She opened with a song that I guess was called Close To Me a decent soul pop love song that she played bass and samples and effects on, that was followed by Waiting For a Change that asked a good few questions of a possible partner that she wanted a bit more from.
She put the bass down for Your In Rome that was a keyboard led plea for a little bit of love and adventure. She played guitar on Tired Of saying all sorts of things that had a quite soulful edge to it, although she was more forceful on Holding On, as she triggered stuff on the keyboards and effects, while she played guitar it was more engaging, but she really could do with some backing musicians to feed off of.
All The Reasons felt familiar as a list of relationship problems in song form, that was followed by her first single that I guess was called Conjure Up and it did have a little bit of magic in it, but not enough to really stand out. She closed with How Can I Apologize, but she really hadn't done anything to need to apologize to the audience for at all, this was a nice gentle come down to close a decent set.
Then with very little ceremony John Cale ambled onstage with his current four piece band that features Dustin Boyer on Guitars, effects and computer thingies, Alex Thomas on Drums, harmonium and effects and trick, and on bass and even more effects Joey Maramba. John played keyboards computers synths and bits and bobs for most of the set as well as singing of course.
They opened with Jumbo In Tha Modern World that had swirling synths and Keyboard washes for the modern day paranoia at the centre of this song, thankfully John's vocals sounded as good as ever.
Moonstruck (Nico's Song) was next and accompanied by some nice oil wheel style split screen in a Warhol style visuals of Nico, as John sang this touching tribute to his old band mate and collaborator.
We then got the first old song of the set in a rather synth pop take on Rosegarden Funeral Of Sores that made this dark troubled song seem far nicer than it is lyrically, this was far less stark then either the original or Bauhaus' classic cover, with a long repeating outro.
John was then looking for Mercy the title track of the new album, this brought the song to life somewhat, as stripped of the thousands of layers on the album the song had more room to breathe, as the message came across nicely.
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Then one of the highlights of the night was Nightcrawling that featured a cartoon that featured among others David Bowie, Jeff Beck and Allen Ginsburg getting up to no good back in the good old days of the 1970's, this is an affectionate tribute to the lives they all led back then, how magnificently sleazy things were. Pretty people was next a song that I am certainly not familiar with, but it sounded ok played at pretty much the same pace as everything else as the guitars worked against the synths and keyboard textures as John railed against all the Pretty People.
Then it was back to Black Acetate for Wasteland that conjures up enough of a dystopian nightmare to be perfect for our current times and some of the harsher noises had the bloke next to me putting his fingers in his ears.
Guts was introduced in Johns standard way "This songs in B Flat", it was also played with a fairly straight arrangement, Noise Of You had some strange effects and kept things at that middling pace that Cale seems so comfortable with these days.
John then took a slow walk to the far side of the stage to pick up his guitar for the only time this show, as he launched into a very sweet version of Cable Hogue that was as crowd pleasing a song as he played all night.
Then it was back to the keyboards for a nasty as all hell take on Half Past France that had some really menacing bass and very paranoid sounding guitar, the drums enmeshing us in the tale of being on the road in a band, as the drums gave way to the computer organ effects. The song ended with several brown note bass salvoes that were disruptive and disturbing.
It was back to the new album for Out Your Window that almost sounded like a synth pop song about committing suicide, it was certainly more compelling than the album version. He then closed the set with a long dark version of Villa Albani a song that I'm shocked has remained in the set, coming as it does form an album John has seemingly blocked from being re-issued.
He'd done just about enough to get the audience to respond enough to get him back for an encore and gave us a nicely fraught reading of Heartbreak Hotel that got to the dark heart of the song in ways that Elvis never could. At the end John said goodnight and hoped to see us again soon as he almost always had in the 39 years I've been seeing him live, long may he continue to entertain and baffle people in concert.
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