Of the two, Cale’s is the more interesting but less essential artefact. There are inspired remakes of old standards: the always hypnotic ‘Venus In Furs’, a perfectly maudlin ‘Buffalo Ballet’, a conjoined ‘Femme Fatale/Funeral Rosegarden Of Sores’ and his creepy deconstructionist take on ‘Heartbreak Hotel’, once succinctly described by Henry Rollins as “Thelonius Monk…melting”. Cale, always an underrated vocalist, is in fine voice, although one sometimes wonders about the compatibility of his band, whose oddly 80s art rock shapes often render the more recent material anomalous, and are a little too slick for irreverant garage rock runs at Rufus Thomas’s ‘Walking The Dog’ and Jonathan Richman’s ‘Pablo Picasso’ (originally produced by Cale himself).

Young’s is the more definitive article. Recorded at a homecoming concert in Toronto in January 1971, the set falls squarely between the release of those bedsit staples ‘After The Gold Rush’ and ‘Harvest’. The late, great producer David Briggs insisted that this album should have been released between the two, and, as ever, the man’s ears did not deceive him. Now canonical titles like ‘Down By The River’, ‘Ohio’ and ‘Cowgirl In The Sand’ are laser-focused and pressure-cooker intense, offering a timely reminder as to what distinguishes the likes of Damien Rice and Glen Hansard from the Jameses Blunt and Morrison . But ‘Massey Hall’ also affords us the opportunity to hear Rathmines after-hours staples like ‘Old Man’, ‘The Needle And The Damage Done’ and ‘Heart Of Gold’ performed as new-minted. Young’s voice is extraordinary throughout, a queer, wavering tenor undercut by that percussive, elbow-heavy acoustic, and, as always, the droll between-song asides are good for a chuckle. Consider this a vivid depiction of Laurel Canyon before the fall. For once, you didn’t have to be there.

One of Ireland’s foremost music and pop culture writers, Peter Murphy (b. 1968, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford) got a taste for journalism at the age of 17 when he won first place in an EU sponsored competition for young essayists. After ten days of being wined, dined and chauffeured around Europe on someone else’s tab, the only proviso being that he file a report at the end of it, he figured this was the way to live. But first, he had to get the rock ‘n’ roll bug out of his system, and spent most of the next decade playing drums with a succession of bands. He quit music to become a journalist in 1996, quickly establishing himself as a senior contributor to Hot Press. Since then he has written over 30 cover stories for the magazine, accumulating a portfolio of interviews that includes Lou Reed, Patti Smith, Nick Cave, Willie Nelson, Radiohead, Public Enemy, Shane MacGowan, George Clinton, Sonic Youth, Television, Henry Rollins, PJ Harvey, Richard Hell, David Johansen, Warren Zevon, Wim Wenders, Iain Banks, Will Self, William Gibson, Billy Bob Thornton, FW De Klerk and many others. His work has also appeared in the Bloodaxe Books anthology Dublines, the Sunday Independent (Ireland) plus international publications such as Rolling Stone (Australia) and Request (US). Miscellaneous assignments include writing the programme notes for jazz legend Miles Davis’ art exhibition hosted by the Davis Gallery in Dublin (2000), collaborations with cult author JT LeRoy for the American magazine Razor (2002), and co-producing Revelations, a two-hour radio documentary about The Frames (2003). He is frequently employed as a rent-a-mouth by the BBC and Irish national radio and television, is a contributor to the online archive Rocksbackpages.com and more recently gave a talk entitled Nocturnal Emissions at the ReJoyce symposium in the National College of Ireland, tracing the influence of James Joyce’s writings on Irish music. He has also been invited to contribute an essay to the liner notes of the 2004 remastered edition of Harry Smith’s Anthology Of American Folk Music, and is currently writing his first novel.