John Cale’s “Night Crawling” (2022)

Well, this is a strange one.  This is the official video for a new song by John Cale called, “Night Crawling.”  The video depicts a cartoon version of Cale and David Bowie walking around New York City at night in the 70s.  The cartoon depicted what they looked like then, and in particular for Bowie, what he looked like around his Thin White Duke period (which was his low point, in terms of addiction and overall unhealthy lifestyle).  The song itself does not mention or even hint at Bowie…and for that matter does not include the words, “night crawling.”  The lyrics, which I had to look up (I found them difficult to understand) seem to be unrelated to the son’g title, or the video.  Nonetheless, as I hear it, it seems to have a similar mood as something off Iggy Pop’s 1977 album, “The Idiot,” which Bowie produced and contributed to in a variety of ways during his Berlin period.  Its hard for me to hear “Night Crawling” and not think about “Nightclubbing” in particular, but again that’s more a sense of mood than any specific references.  

I am not especially familiar with the work of John Cale, and am most familiar with some of what he did as part of the Velvet Underground, all of which dates back to before I was born.  He’s done a lifetime’s of work since then which might be worth exploring.  

So what’s Bowie’s connection?  Seems like inspiration.  Cale was quoted in a recent Rolling Stone story about the song, “There was this period around mid-late Seventies when David and I would run into each other in New York. There was plenty of talk about getting some work done but of course we’d end up running the streets, sometimes until we couldn’t keep a thought in our heads, let alone actually get a song together! One night we managed to meet up for a benefit concert where I taught him a viola part so we could perform together,” Cale continued. “When I wrote ‘Night Crawling,’ it was a reflective moment of particular times. That kind of NYC that held art in its grip, strong enough to keep it safe and dangerous enough to keep it interesting. I always figured we’d have another go at the two of us recording together, this time without the interference of being perpetually off our heads! The thing about creating music is the ability to divine a thought or feeling even when reality says it’s a logical impossibility.”