He's up there with Neil Young for me...some awful music but well outweighed by the amount of brilliant tunes...and like others have said New York alone earns him huge respect from me.
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Lou Reed?
- Thread starter Verne Andru
- Start date
I just thought he was weird. But, back in the day, he was popular.
I became an instant fan when I first saw him do Wild side on Don Kirshner's Rock Concert. I got to see him live for the first time around 1986 when Robert Quine was playing with him. Lou would be my desert island pick.
Weirdest time I ever saw him live was at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, in 1984, with Run-DMC opening for him. MTV was video recording it, and a substantial part of the audience booed Run-DMC until they left in the middle of their set, with the backing beat 12" still playing on Jam Master J's turntable. To my amazement it's up on YouTube, boos and walkout included.
Reed came onstage and just said, "You didn't like that huh?" then his band came out and he started his set.
Reed came onstage and just said, "You didn't like that huh?" then his band came out and he started his set.
His live album in the 70's was amazing and Fernando Saunders crushed it when he was in the band .
I once tuned my guitar to Ostrich tuning and it was like, “whoa . . . instant Velvet Underground!”
Mebbe I got the wrong record, but I thought Weld was the instrumental feedback EP?
Just kinda matching it up.
You want rock noise-guitar, tho', there's better stuff mebbe, Beaster is a fave, any MBV, JAMC, SY ... I like "vocals" on top.
Words fail in describing what the VU, and Lou(on a good day)meant to me. Yes, when he dropped the ball, it was cringe time, but he would always bounce back. I was a fan since I was 13, when the Velvets with Doug Yule were still actually together. The guy was beyond a poet, it was an intense journalism of sorts, and while early on I didn’t fully understand a lot of the narratives at the time, as I got older I realized it prepared me for all sorts of adult situations. Thankfully, it was while observing others experiencing certain questionable scenarios.
Still, I got to know a few poor girl(s)at all those parties, femme fatales, even a venus in furs(never was a client
), and I just stood back and stayed clear. I went through, play by play(with slight minor changes in details), an L.A. version of “Waiting For The Man”, as a friend, who was on tour, needed transport to go visit that brownstone. No, it wasn’t pleasant, but it was an urgent situation. He eventually cleaned up.
Berlin got me through an unrelated(to the album’s storyline)dark period of my life, as it reminded me that things could always be worse, and it was way ahead of trends, being a brutally honest portrayal of domestic abuse. Yet, as a bonus it featured some of my favorite bass playing by Jack Bruce. “Pale Blue Eyes” just nailed it on the head for me in a certain personal episode, such a gorgeous but sad song, and way before that, when I got the break-up call from my first serious girlfriend in high school, what was playing on the turntable? “Perfect Day”. Oh, the irony, but it’s kind of a self-pity tune anyway.
Musically, those not familiar with VU(or Lou)will never understand it, but they were second in far ranging influence, exponentially perhaps, only to the Beatles. If you know, you know. They created the late 70’s a decade earlier, and their/his music is so singular that it’s not stuck in any particular time period, not drenched in nostalgia.
It continues through generations to this very day. I hear strains of it in all sorts of places. Persons in one of my favorite new(er) bands, Wet Leg, mentioned that they were fans, and then this young British guy was so obsessed that he recently did a vast series of videos where he broke down all the songs, playing all the parts…
Plus all the analysis/historical vids, and endless covers, by scores of other people, some very notable, some from potentially next door.
Oh, and if you ever work retail where you have control of the background music, it’s getting near closing time and you want to clear the store of straggler looky-loos, just put on “The Kids”. Works like a charm.
Still, I got to know a few poor girl(s)at all those parties, femme fatales, even a venus in furs(never was a client
), and I just stood back and stayed clear. I went through, play by play(with slight minor changes in details), an L.A. version of “Waiting For The Man”, as a friend, who was on tour, needed transport to go visit that brownstone. No, it wasn’t pleasant, but it was an urgent situation. He eventually cleaned up.Berlin got me through an unrelated(to the album’s storyline)dark period of my life, as it reminded me that things could always be worse, and it was way ahead of trends, being a brutally honest portrayal of domestic abuse. Yet, as a bonus it featured some of my favorite bass playing by Jack Bruce. “Pale Blue Eyes” just nailed it on the head for me in a certain personal episode, such a gorgeous but sad song, and way before that, when I got the break-up call from my first serious girlfriend in high school, what was playing on the turntable? “Perfect Day”. Oh, the irony, but it’s kind of a self-pity tune anyway.
Musically, those not familiar with VU(or Lou)will never understand it, but they were second in far ranging influence, exponentially perhaps, only to the Beatles. If you know, you know. They created the late 70’s a decade earlier, and their/his music is so singular that it’s not stuck in any particular time period, not drenched in nostalgia.
It continues through generations to this very day. I hear strains of it in all sorts of places. Persons in one of my favorite new(er) bands, Wet Leg, mentioned that they were fans, and then this young British guy was so obsessed that he recently did a vast series of videos where he broke down all the songs, playing all the parts…
Plus all the analysis/historical vids, and endless covers, by scores of other people, some very notable, some from potentially next door.
Oh, and if you ever work retail where you have control of the background music, it’s getting near closing time and you want to clear the store of straggler looky-loos, just put on “The Kids”. Works like a charm.
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I read this book on him, and he was an absolute b'staad.
Attachments
Considering what his parents put him through…the electroshock therapy and all, I’m not surprised. But…those were different times.
Ridin' in a Stutz Bearcat, Jim. You know those were different times.
I know people who were put through the ringer by their parents and they weren't a-holes. I know someone who was lobotomized because she 'acted out' at home. But again, not an a-hole. But I do know tons of arrogant people, many in the music business who, like Reed, abused drugs and their moodiness and abrasiveness increased with that. Reed was infamously combative, aloof, cold, condescending and hostile to people (even his friends) -- at one point in the 70s David Bowie (who was a fan) had been trying to help Reed professionally, offering him advice and possibly suggesting that he change his management or musical approach. Reed got angry and punched Bowie out in a restaurant. Don't blame Reed's parents for that.
Reed noticably softened in his mid 60s when he began his relationship then 3rd marriage to Laurie Anderson.
Yes, in a roundabout way Lou got me into playing music. In high school I didn't really have musical tastes or awareness, but a new friend of mine wanted to play a set of VU covers as part of a final assignment in his English class. He played guitar and sang and already had a band, but needed someone to play electric viola and asked me if I was game. I said "sure", he acquired a viola and pickup from the concert band for me, and I spent the next few weeks learning to play the droning viola parts for Heroin and Venus in Furs with the sustained all-consuming intensity that teens are capable of.
As a result, I learned a ton about music in a very short span of time. Went on to sing lead in a blues cover band and picked up the bass (starting with a double bass that was also "acquired" by the same friend) to play some more high school-era gigs with the same guy.
Decades later, I still find Reed's œuvre and breadth of character fascinating. He could be such an ******* as a person, and yet his work opened the door for a ton of musicians stylistically and lyrically (as in, gritty lyrical poetry covering so much more than puppy dog love).
Oh and I bought a copy of MMM on vinyl (knowing full well what I was getting into), left it on the dashboard while I worked in the hot sun, and it was warped like crazy by the time I got to play it. That might have improved the album, heh!
As a result, I learned a ton about music in a very short span of time. Went on to sing lead in a blues cover band and picked up the bass (starting with a double bass that was also "acquired" by the same friend) to play some more high school-era gigs with the same guy.
Decades later, I still find Reed's œuvre and breadth of character fascinating. He could be such an ******* as a person, and yet his work opened the door for a ton of musicians stylistically and lyrically (as in, gritty lyrical poetry covering so much more than puppy dog love).
Oh and I bought a copy of MMM on vinyl (knowing full well what I was getting into), left it on the dashboard while I worked in the hot sun, and it was warped like crazy by the time I got to play it. That might have improved the album, heh!
Somebody needs to take this image, and go full Shaw Brothers fight scene prompt into a generative AI platform (I'm throwing the gauntlet down at your feet @JRA )
"The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band." Eno
we'll see --- i'm getting ready for a recording session tonight, but maybe i can give it a whirl later. fun idea! 
10,000, or maybe 30,000."The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band." Eno
