I'm not much into his solo 70s output, which is the case for that vein of auteur 70s art rock in general
and I reckon Reed had the better solo career because he was a better songwriter - no surprise there, he was one of the greatest songwriters ever
but Cale certainly trumps him when it comes to collaborative projects, and as a producer
the true shining moment was their collaboration, the marriage of Reed's songwriting genius to Cale's avant-drone madness
tho it wasn't like, a total opposites thing
even in this pre-VU novelty record Reed made during his time as in-house songwriter at shlock label Pickwick, you can hear proto-driving drone rock
and he was well into free jazz in the early 60s, as well as studying poetry etc with Delmore Schwartz
going the other way, you have this pre-VU Cale solo piece, which sounds like "Sister Ray" if it was just a guitar