Brian Eno and John Cale
Opal, 1990
Reissued on All Saints/Hannibal, 2005
I can’t believe this thing is 18 years old. This album could vote. It could legally marry albums of the same sex in certain parts of the country. I’m not that old, and I’ve had the same copy of it for probably fifteen years or so – a promo CD with a hole-punch in the right-hand corner of the booklet. I recently upgraded with the 2005 reissue. More about that later.
Wrong Way Up is a record that can almost be as defined by what it isn’t as what it is. When it came out, I was fourteen or so. I knew Eno from his role in the second through fourth Talking Heads albums, which were already dear to my adolescent heart (and you couldn’t pick a better drummer to match your heartbeat to than Chris Franz). I knew the Velvet Underground, but Cale represented everything edgy and weird about them to me – the scraping viola, that profound extra-rock element that, even more than Lou Reed’s perverted outlook, separated them from the perceived boomer blandness of much of ‘60s rock. I didn’t know either man’s solo careers yet…so what would this be? Jerky electro-acoustic rhythms with harsh viola harmonics? Ambient electro synth blips? Neo-classical mood music?
Sigh of relief. It’s pop music. Sigh of astonishment. It’s playful, jovial pop music. It’s actually fun. Maybe I was just 14, but I knew these were characters known for being a bit on the dry and theoretical side at times. So how cool is it to hear them aping the Beach Boys on “Empty Frame,” or giddily rocking out on “Been There Done That”?
This was a disk I wore out back in ’93 or so. My friend’s step-dad had it, and my friend nicked it and played it for me…I bought a promo for five bucks at one of those god-awful record swap-meets at the Radisson hotel (the one that looks like a castle) in Atlanta. I learned the chords to pretty much all the songs. I tried to imitate Eno’s rhythm programs on the primitive keyboard I had. Every time I picked up a violin, I hacked away at the “Lay My Love” riff, which is in F, not an easy key for a novice fiddler.
I had sorta forgotten about this one for the past five years or so…then a reissue quietly snuck out. It had a pair of extra tracks – an unreleased instrumental and Eno’s version of “You Don’t Miss Your Water,” which had been on the Married to the Mob soundtrack, I think. But more importantly, it had a lyric sheet – which was not included in the original package. Deciphering the lyrics through the haze of multi-tracking and reverb on the album was never easy…reading through them for the first time was pretty revelatory – like running into an old friend on the street that you haven’t seen in years. You talk, you catch up, you are overwhelmed by new information. Once the shock of the new dies down (the lyrics), you are left with the warm familiar glow, unchanged (the music). It’s particularly great to know exactly what they are saying in “One Word,” a song in which Eno and Cale sing different things at the same time, beautifully folkishly intertwined.
I’ve been fascinated by these sessions, and tried to get every bit of music that emerged from them. In addition to the album tracks and the two bonus cuts on the reissue, I’ve found these nuggets:
- “Grandfather’s House”: A pleasant Cale-sung number, included on the “One Word” maxi-single (remember those?)
- “Ring of Fire”: A surprisingly bland and disappointing Eno-sung version of the Johnny Cash classic, released on a promo-only clear-vinyl 45.
- “Shuffle Down to Woodbridge”: An instrumental credited to Cale, also on the clear-vinyl 45.
Clearly the good stuff is on the record! I’m not sure if there is anything else…there’s so little Eno vocal material out there, I’m sure every morsel is relentlessly documented, and I’d know if there was any other stuff.
I guess a good record is like an equation: two sides balanced by an equal sign. On one side is this disk, with all it’s wonder and playful questions. On the other side of the equal sign are my fourteen-year-old ears, unencumbered and ready for something, anything. I’m not sure if I played it for my friends if they’d laugh at me or not, but Wrong Way Up still sounds good to me now…
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