Welsh singer Kelly Lee Owens reached out to John Cale to come up with the vocals for her pulsating electronics composition Corner Of My Sky, a single from her forthcoming album Inner Song, out via Smalltown Supersound on August 28. Cale came up with a haunting spoken word piece, delivered in English and Welsh. It could be considered as a sort of follow for this guest spot on The Insult on the Trash Palace album Positions.
John Cale about how the track came together:
It's not usually this immediate that a productive afternoon brings a satisfying conclusion to a task. I met Kelly a while back when working on a song for my album in London, and was intrigued by the possibility of a future collaboration - maybe even something in Welsh. Several months later Kelly popped up and timing worked out. She sent me a track she'd written -an instrumental that was a gentle drift - something comfortably familiar to what I'd been working on myself. On the first listen -the lyrics came with ease and a chorus and melody grew out of it . Even the Welsh phrases seemed to develop from a place of reflective memory which was a surprise since I hadn't written in Welsh for decades. Once finished, i realized there existed a built-in thread we'd created together and apart - and her kind spirit pulled it all together and in quick order.
Kelly Lee Owens on the collaboration:
I knew with this album I needed to connect with my roots & therefore having the welsh language featured on the record felt very important to me. Once the music for the track was written and the sounds were formed, I could immediately hear John’s voice on it. Working with him had always been a dream of mine and so I sent the track straight to him & asked if he could perhaps delve into his Welsh heritage & tell the story of the land via spoken-word, poetry & song.
What he sent back was nothing short of phenomenal and I knew exactly how to arrange it. The arrangement was done during the mixing process & once I’d finished the track, I cried - firstly feeling incredibly lucky to have collaborated with John & his eternal talent & secondly for both of us to have been able to connect to our homeland in this way.
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