Tag Archive: velvet underground


Happenings 52 Years Time Ago

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February 15, 2018

1966 – The Year The Decade Exploded by Jon Savage (Faber & Faber, 2015)

1966“It’s pretty obvious that contemporary music reflects contemporary life. And vice versa” wrote Tony Hall in Record Mirror in 1966. What is taken for granted now needed to be spelled out then.

Nevertheless, there are still precious few writers who able to contextualize music as expertly as Jon Savage.

When writing about Punk in 2004’s ‘England’s Dreaming’, Savage was able to draw directly from his own experiences but, as he was just 13 years old in the Summer of 1966, he is not able to rely solely on first-hand knowledge for this book. The 55 pages of source references illustrate the substantial research that lies behind this authoritative and illuminating study.

I was just 8 years old in that year so I remember even less than he does but I do recall the impact of some TV shows (e.g. Batman, The Monkees, Time Tunnel etc.) and music like The Beatles, the Motown acts and Dusty Springfield. But as far as historical events go, only England winning the soccer world cup sticks in the memory.

Most articles about the sixties paint a superficial and idealised portrait of swinging London, sexual liberation and the birth of the Woodstock generation. Savage goes deeper and reveals the darker aspects of this era and shows that it has definite parallels with the world we inhabit today.

Far from being a time of hedonism and freedom, this was a year lived under the shadow of the atom bomb and the cold war. In addition, the black civil rights movement, growing opposition to the Vietnam war, the demand for women’s liberation and the struggle for gay rights were just some of the causes that led to politicization of the youth both in America and in the UK. Add LSD to this heady cocktail and it’s easy to understand why this year was so musically explosive and accounts for how “1966 began in pop and ended with rock”. Continue reading →

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LOU’S GONE

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October 27, 2013
lou_reed

LOU REED (1942 – 2013)

Lou Reed has gone but is guaranteed as a rock and roll immortal – play all the sad songs you know.

A lot of words will be written in the next few days and weeks. All will confirm that he was one of the towering figures of rock.

For his work with The Velvet Underground alone, he deserves a place in every hall of fame. They are still a band who sound ahead of their time.

His solo work was more uneven but always real.

He had no time for bullshit or the pretentious glam that saps the creative force of lesser mortals.

Berlin and New York are my own favorites but you can find something worthy in everything he did. Continue reading →

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LOU AND LULU

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November 13, 2011

220px-lou_reed_and_metallica_-_luluLou Reed is not someone who suffers fools gladly but, despite this, he is a kind of spokesman for the underdog; a poet laureate for the lost or confused.

In the lyrics to the title track of his solo album Street Hassle (1978) he wrote/sang:
“Some people got no choice
and they can never find a voice
to talk with, that they can ever call their own,
so the first thing they see
that allows them the right to be,
why, they follow it – y’know, it’s called bad luck”.

He’ll be 70 next year and these days he’s mellowed a little but not a lot. He still looks like someone I’d hate to be the wrong side of. On BBC2’s Later his appearance was of one who has lived more than one hard life.

His status as rock legend is secure, not least for writing the definitive songs about hard drugs and sado-masochism when part of Velvet Underground; Heroine and Venus In Furs respectively.

He could be forgiven for resting on his laurels and writing his memoirs or slim volumes of poetry. Instead, he can be found rocking out with Metallica for an album called Lulu, a partnership which came about when they had fun jamming together at the Rock’n’Roll Hall of Fame’s 25th anniversary concert in 2009.

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Lou and Metallica having fun!

The collection of ten songs were ready to record, having been commissioned by director-choreographer Robert Wilson. They are inspired by the femme fatale of German expressionist Frank Wedekind’s plays : Earth Spirit (1895) and Pandora’s Box  (1904). Wild side themes of desire, prostitution, death and abuse are right up Lou’s street and sound great with a heavy metal backing.

Darren (Black Swan) Aronofsky is to shoot a video for the song Iced Honey, one of two tracks Reed and Metallica performed on BBC2’s Later; the other being The View. This was the first time songs from the album have been played in public.

They also added a version of VU’s White Light, White Heat recognisable only because the words of the title, otherwise it bore little relation to the original. They rocked so hard, they can be forgiven for taking such liberties with this classic.

Above all, the partnership works really well as it takes Metallica out of Spinal Tap territory and gives a spiky edge to Lou’s words. It’s all about keeping the passion alive which it does, in spades.

Related link:
Listen to Lulu (Streaming at loureedmetallica.com/)

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BACKTRACKING #21: LOU REED’S PERFECT DAY

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July 16, 2011

Part of an irregular series of bite-sized posts about 7″ singles I own – shameless nostalgia from the days of vinyl. (Search ‘Backtracking’ to collect the set!)

LOU REED : Walk On The Wild Side b/w Perfect Day (RCA Victor, 1972)

I thought I was someone good

Lou Reed is not renowned for being a sentimental man.

He has built his reputation on songs with Velvet Underground and beyond  about life on the dark side : suicide, prostitution, S & M and hard drugs.

This makes this song all the more surprising and touching. On the face of it, Perfect Day is a blissful romantic memory of spending quality time with a loved one. Simple pleasures of drinking Sangria in the park, a visit to the zoo and a trip to the movies are like an amalgamation of ideal  things to do with a partner. A walk on the sunny side in contrast to the A side stroll down meaner streets.

But there are black clouds on the horizon that threaten this idyll. The key line for me is when Lou sings “You made me forget myself, I thought I was someone else…..someone good”. This transforms the song from a song of innocence to one of experience. Lou does not in his wildest dreams imagine life is really like this for very long and wants us to know that he knows.

The song first appeared on the overrated 1972 album Transformer produced by David Bowie. This was Bowie doing his rescue act for a hero in crisis, an act he also performed for Iggy Pop with The Idiot and Lust For Life.

A star-studded cover for Children In Need means the song is now remembered as a message of charity and hope so any negative subtext has been effectively eliminated.

Walk On the Wild Side itself has also become a standard that has lost any shock value it might have had. It makes me smile that this was not banned by the prudes at the BBC who presumably at that time didn’t know the significance of “giving head”. I saw Lou Reed perform this live on two occasions as an encore each time. Both times he murdered it – it was like he was miffed by the fact that this has become his ‘big hit’.

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A condensed history of drone music

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May 11, 2008

A HIGHLY CONDENSED HISTORY OF DRONES IN MUSIC AND SOME BLOG-SIZED THOUGHTS ON WHY PEOPLE STILL LISTEN TO THEM
In Indian music the four stringed tambura is used to produce the drone which is commonly known as a ‘Raag’ – a colloquial word for the classical term ‘raga’. This describes the scale pattern and melodic motif as well as being a word that embraces the philosophical and moral ideas defining a musical performance.
In Northern Indian classical music, improvisation takes place with the musical anchor of any one of 200 main raags. Each one is different and contains its own complex set of rules. In India another way of saying ‘drone’ is ‘Nada Brahma’ (God is sound).
American composer, La Monte Young is generally credited with bringing the drone from its Indian roots into the Western classical environment. Check out his Notes on Continuous Periodic Composite Sound Waveform Environment Realizations for some un-light reading & audio samples.
John Cale, himself a former pupil of La Monte Young, helped redefine this radicalism from Avant-Garde modernist backwater into the realm of popular music on tracks like The Velvet Underground’s ‘Venus In Furs’.
The use of single repetitive tones is in marked contrast to the conventional sound of Western Pop’s structured hooks and climaxes.
So why do people still listen to them?
John Blades, a radio programmer from Australia put forward a convincing explanation:
“in recent years, there has been an increase in total listening, and drone listening requires total immersion in the sound environment. I also believe that, with the global atmosphere of violence and terrorism, meditative and total listening experiences are more highly regarded”
In other words drones can connect the listener to the need for a sense of permanence and stability. Those who criticise the lack of variety are missing the fact that this is also a significant part of its appeal.
While New Weird links to ethereal acoustic folk can clearly be heard in modern drone-based artists like Pelt, Double Leopards and Six Organs of Admittance, drones are also a key element in the psych-rock tribalism of more noise orientated bands like Animal Collective, Yellow Swans or Vibracathedral Orchestra.
An actively engaged listener can see the monotone not as monotony but as possibility -an absorbing sonic canvas which can create meditative moods, disorientation or a healthy combination of both.

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