I really wanted to like this disc. Really, I did. John Cale -- for the uninitiated or just plain retarded -- was the viola player for the Velvet Underground. When he left, he had a solo career that didn't get him much in record royalties but Christ Almighty, did he make some great albums, most notably Paris 1919 and Fear.

Now John's unleashed Walking On Locusts, an album that's long on production sheen a la adult contemporary radio and short on his usually grandiose pop smarts. Things start off promising enough with the slick but not so bad "Dancing Undercover," which includes a typically great Cale line: "Deadly nightshade is beautiful / I could stare at it for hours." Sung in his wryly detatched way, it works.

But Cale's impotence intrudes and the album goes very limp. The next cut, "Set Me Free," aims for lush ballad and comes up with a handful of shit. His team-up with the formerly awesome David Byrne on "Crazy Egypt" isn't half bad, but that also means it's half crap. You can tell Byrne had his hand in it, what with the shuffling percussion and hyperactive wordplay that doesn't mean a friggin' thing. It's two disappointments in one: The fall of two greats. Luckily, Cale doesn't drag anyone else into the mire, save the late, great Sterling Morrison, to whom the tepid "Some Friends" is dedicated.

Pick up The Island Years (a three album compilation) or the amazing Paris 1919 for Cale at his best. To see a legend in decline, well, Walking On Locusts should do the trick.

-Jason Josephes