John Cale

John Cale Where: Royce Hall (UCLA), 340 Royce Drive When: 8 p.m. Thursday Price: $38 to $68 Info: http://www.uclalive.com

News of Lou Reed's death hit the music world as hard and fast as a kick pedal on a bass drum Sunday morning, and resonated just as loudly. As word spread, many on Facebook changed their profile pictures to that of the legendary Velvet Underground frontman's face, and Twitter erupted with appreciations from all corners of the globe. "The world has lost a fine songwriter and poet... I've lost my 'school-yard buddy'," tweeted John Cale, who co-founded what would become the Velvet Underground with Reed in 1964, when both men were in their early 20s. PHOTOS: Lou Reed | 1942-2013 Those who knew and loved the musician, sometimes from up close and sometimes just from afar, also weighed in. Aerosmith's Steven Tyler Tweeted, "RIP TO A GREAT FRIEND A FELLOW MUSICIAN.

"When we started in the '60s we were trying to be radical and commercial at the same time, which is really opening a can of worms," says John Cale, recalling the heyday of the Velvet Underground. "When we got on stage we turned up the amps, destroyed the equipment, acted unsociable. It wasn't entertainment, it was aversion therapy--but with a human side."

"White House Down" is a hoot and a half, a shameless popcorn entertainment that is preposterous and diverting in just about equal measure. This story of "the worst day this country ever had" - a roughly 12-hour period when an armed paramilitary group blows up the Capitol and takes over the White House - is very much something you get a kick out of against your better judgment. In fact, if the amount of disbelief that needs to be suspended to enjoy this movie could be turned into dollars, it would pay off the national debt with some money left over to buy star Channing Tatum, director Roland Emmerich and screenwriter James Vanderbilt a round of beers.

Listeners got something more than mere songs from avant-garde rock pioneer John Cale during his Monday performance at the Key Club. It was art. And music. Art music. Two great tastes that tasted great together -- at least, as mixed by this master.

Given a title like "Vintage Violence," listeners might expect some pretty fierce lyrics and music from this album. But instead John Cale, emerging for the first time since he'd left the Velvet Underground in 1968, transmitted the toughness of the era in quite classical terms. Cale was and is a rare bird in pop music: a trained musician. A native of Wales, he first came to America on a Leonard Bernstein scholarship, and his classical training illuminates this beautiful record.

One of the great benefits of the compact disc revolution is that hundreds of underappreciated--indeed, previously deleted--albums have been given new life. Among them: John Cale's "Paris 1919," an inspired, sometimes elegant work, arguably the iconoclastic Welshman's most accessible effort. Some of the melodies here are so rich and enticing that it's hard to understand why this album didn't make more of a commercial dent when it was released more than 20 years ago.

Few rock musicians have pursued an agenda as diverse as John Cale's. His hugely influential first band, the Velvet Underground, was marginal in its time (1965-70) but since has become a rock-cultural monument. The Velvets are recognized as the cornerstone of the "alternative" rock movement that, shockingly, has come to occupy a penthouse suite in the commercial edifice of '90s pop.

You don't often hear the name John Cale and the words "street fair" together, but that was the case Saturday when the Velvet Underground veteran was among the top acts playing Day 1 of the annual Sunset Junction Street Fair.

Whether featuring Pavement, the Pixies or the Police, reunion concerts have become the default when it comes to live music. John Cale's restaging of his classic 1973 album "Paris 1919" ? hitting UCLA's Royce Hall on Thursday ? transcends a mere nostalgia trip, however. For one, "Paris 1919" doesn't have the mainstream consumer awareness of, say, "Zenyatta Mondatta": It remains as challenging a work as it is gorgeous and nuanced. In a 9.5 Pitchfork review of the album's 2006 reissue, critic Matthew Murphy praised the album's "stately, haunted grandeur," concluding, "For better or worse, Cale has never again made another record quite like 'Paris 1919,' at least in part, one suspects, because so many in his audience have since longed for him to do so. " As such, many consider "Paris 1919" the idiosyncratic pinnacle to Cale's thrilling yet perverse career, despite the fact it never topped the charts.

John Cale Where: Royce Hall (UCLA), 340 Royce Drive When: 8 p.m. Thursday Price: $38 to $68 Info: http://www.uclalive.com

Whether featuring Pavement, the Pixies or the Police, reunion concerts have become the default when it comes to live music. John Cale's restaging of his classic 1973 album "Paris 1919" ? hitting UCLA's Royce Hall on Thursday ? transcends a mere nostalgia trip, however. For one, "Paris 1919" doesn't have the mainstream consumer awareness of, say, "Zenyatta Mondatta": It remains as challenging a work as it is gorgeous and nuanced. In a 9.5 Pitchfork review of the album's 2006 reissue, critic Matthew Murphy praised the album's "stately, haunted grandeur," concluding, "For better or worse, Cale has never again made another record quite like 'Paris 1919,' at least in part, one suspects, because so many in his audience have since longed for him to do so. " As such, many consider "Paris 1919" the idiosyncratic pinnacle to Cale's thrilling yet perverse career, despite the fact it never topped the charts.

You don't often hear the name John Cale and the words "street fair" together, but that was the case Saturday when the Velvet Underground veteran was among the top acts playing Day 1 of the annual Sunset Junction Street Fair.

Listeners got something more than mere songs from avant-garde rock pioneer John Cale during his Monday performance at the Key Club. It was art. And music. Art music. Two great tastes that tasted great together -- at least, as mixed by this master.

Velvet Underground founding member John Cale is an iconoclast of legendary passions. At the El Rey Theatre, where he performed on Wednesday, he delivered little of his trademark disturbing theatrics. At times reminiscent of Leonard Cohen--but without Cohen's pointed attack and agility with irony, Cale came across as tame as the bouncy avant-pop on the new "Walking on Locusts," his first rock album in a decade.

John Cale came to the Coach House on Monday to promote a new double-CD compilation of his post-Velvet Underground music. So he played a set with hardly any songs from the collection. A typically contrary gesture from the 52-year-old musician, whose varied body of work has been treasured by a loyal cult that's followed his moves from rock psychodrama to orchestrated Dylan Thomas poems, from stately, folk-like ballads to ambitious song cycles.

The late Andy Warhol, who prospered in part by creating portraits of the famous, is now on the receiving end. The medium is music, and the artists are two essential rock figures whose careers Warhol helped launch 25 years ago. The work is "Songs for Drella," a 15-song biography of the Pop Art icon that marks the first collaboration by Lou Reed and John Cale since their stormy partnership in the Velvet Underground, the band that Warhol shepherded into rock legend in the swinging '60s.

John Cale came to the Coach House on Monday to promote a new double-CD compilation of his post-Velvet Underground music. So he played a set with hardly any songs from the collection. A typically contrary gesture from the 52-year-old musician, whose classical grounding and avant-garde sensibilities were instrumental in making the Velvets such a wellspring of inspiration for subsequent rock 'n' roll. His own varied body of work has been treasured by a loyal cult that has followed his moves from rock psychodrama to orchestrated Dylan Thomas poems, from stately, folk-like ballads to ambitious song cycles.

John Cale came to the Coach House on Monday to promote a new double-CD compilation of his post-Velvet Underground music. So he played a set with hardly any songs from the collection. A typically contrary gesture from the 52-year-old musician, whose classical grounding and avant-garde sensibilities were instrumental in making the Velvets such a wellspring of inspiration for subsequent rock 'n' roll. His own varied body of work has been treasured by a loyal cult that has followed his moves from rock psychodrama to orchestrated Dylan Thomas poems, from stately, folk-like ballads to ambitious song cycles.