Lou Reed

by Anthony DeCurtis

  43. “This schmuck, he tried to kill himself”: Author interview, Ed McCormack.

  Chapter 6. All the Things That Are Missing

  1. “Oh, I guess they’re going to be the Velveteen Underground”: Author interview, Danny Fields.

  2. “I was still very foreign”: David Fricke, liner notes, Loaded: Fully Loaded Edition (Rhino/Atlantic).

  3. “worked for forty dollars a week”: Richie Unterberger, White Light/White Heat: The Velvet Underground Day by Day (Jawbone Press, 2009), p. 292.

  4. “easily one of the best albums to show up”: Lenny Kaye, review of Loaded, Rolling Stone, December 24, 1970.

  5. “Due to a near-textbook case of management hassles”: Kaye, review of Loaded.

  6. “Interestingly, the English band Squeeze”: Jason P. Woodbury, “Squeeze’s Chris Difford on England, John Cale, and the Paul McCartney–Produced Record That Never Came to Be,” Phoenix New Times, April 11, 2012, http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/music/squeezes-chris-difford-on-england-john-cale-and-the-paul-mccartney-produced-record-that-never-came-to-be-6610763#page-2.

  7. “He didn’t make the most positive impression” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  8. “Lou would tell me how much he loved Bettye” and following: Author interview, Ed McCormack.

  9. “there was some thought about going to corporations” and following: Author interview, Lenny Kaye.

  10. “When Lou would come into the city”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  11. “We made fun of her”: Author interview, Danny Fields.

  12. “It’s just making a rock-and-roll album”: Richard Williams, Melody Maker, quoted in liner notes to Lou Reed (BMG, 2000) by David Fricke.

  13. “This is the closest realization”: From Disc and Music Echo, quoted in liner notes to Lou Reed.

  14. “Back in London, the consensus is”: David Fricke, liner notes, Lou Reed.

  15. “How successful is an album that keeps you imagining”: Greg Shaw, review of Lou Reed (RCA), Phonograph Record, May 1972.

  16. “There’s just too many things wrong with it”: Mick Rock, “Lou Reed Sees the Future, Darkly,” Rolling Stone, October 26, 1972.

  Chapter 7. Transformer

  1. “I’ve not been particularly good”: Vic Garbarini, “Lou Reed: Waiting for the Muse,” Musician, July 1, 1986.

  2. “I been in and out of mental institutions”: Susan Braudy, “James Taylor: A New Troubadour,” the New York Times Magazine, February 21, 1971.

  3. “he viewed the Velvet Underground as an essential influence”: Charles Shaar Murray, “David at the Dorchester: Bowie on Ziggy and Other Matters,” New Musical Express, July 22, 1972.

  4. “had a rule: no blues licks”: Garbarini, “Lou Reed: Waiting for the Muse.”

  5. “I seem to inspire transvestite bands”: Mick Rock, “Lou Reed Sees the Future, Darkly,” Rolling Stone, October 26, 1972.

  6. “Lou was going through an incredibly bad patch” and following: Marc Spitz, Bowie: A Biography (Crown, 2009), p. 171.

  7. “Glam rock, androgyny, polymorphic sex”: Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart, American Masters documentary, directed by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, 1998.

  8. “I wanted to see how he did things in the studio”: David Fricke, “Lou Reed,” Rolling Stone, November 5–December 10, 1987.

  9. “The year started out with David Bowie”: Billboard, quoted in Spitz, Bowie, p. 200.

  10. “That was a really exciting time”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  11. “While Lou’s solo debut had been difficult”: Lisa Robinson, There Goes Gravity: A Life in Rock and Roll (Riverhead Books, 2014), pp. 86–87.

  12. “shades and maroon fingernails” and following: Murray, “David at the Dorchester.”

  13. “I remember David in interviews”: Author interview, Mick Rock.

  14. “I was petrified that he said yes to working with me” and following: Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart, American Masters documentary.

  15. “I think his new material on the album that we’re gonna do”: Murray, “David at the Dorchester.”

  16. “a classic… absolutely brilliant”: Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart, American Masters documentary.

  17. “They’re just cursory sketches”: “Walk on the Wild Side,” Lou Reed, Rolling Stone, September 8, 1988.

  18. “With a name like that it was too good to leave alone”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary directed by Bob Smeaton (Eagle Rock Entertainment), 2001.

  19. “They were the ragtag queens of Max’s Kansas City”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  20. “I have always thought it would be kinda fun”: Nick Kent, “A Walk on the Wild Side of Lou Reed,” New Musical Express, June 9, 1973.

  21. “Writing songs is like making a play”: Richard Witts, The Velvet Underground (Equinox Publishing, 2006), p. 44.

  22. “Ronson’s influence…‘was stronger than David’s’”: Nick Kent, “Lou Reed: The Sinatra of the Seventies,” New Musical Express, April 28, 1973.

  23. “With Ronno and David there was a real simpatico”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  24. “Lou used to say some funny things to me”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  25. “The thing with Ronno is that I could very rarely understand a word he said”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  26. “I actually wasn’t aware of it, if it happened”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  27. “It’s what I thought about Andy being shot”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  28. “Vicious, I hit you with a flower”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  29. “Here is this whole glam thing going on”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  30. “You can’t imagine how profound and delirious it was”: Don Shewey, Lou Reed in memoriam, loureed.com, http://www.loureed.com/inmemoriam/.

  31. “We had plans to meet in the park” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  32. “Lou pounced on it”: Author interview, Mick Rock.

  33. “an effeminate Frankenstein monster”: Ed McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall,” Rolling Stone, March 1, 1973.

  34. “the degenerate side of glam”: Author interview, Mick Rock.

  35. “Haven’t you seen the cover?”: Ray Fox-Cumming, “Lou Reed: The Black Sheep of New York,” Disc and Music Echo, October 21, 1972.

  36. “I could have had a whole new career”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  37. “It’s just showbiz”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  38. “In the midst of all the make-believe madness, the mock depravity”: Classic Albums: Lou Reed, Transformer, documentary.

  39. “real cockteaser”: Nick Tosches, review of Transformer, Rolling Stone, January 4, 1973.

  40. “This new album is further proof”: Robot A. Hull, review of Transformer, Creem, February 1973.

  41. “the Lou Reed Chic album”: Kent, “A Walk on the Wild Side of Lou Reed.”

  42. “It is his best-ever album”: Fox-Cumming, “Lou Reed: The Black Sheep of New York.”

  Chapter 8. A City’s Divided Soul

  1. “The fact is that his association with David Bowie”: Richard Williams, “Broken Reed? Lou Reed, Duncan Browne: Sundown Theatre, Edmonton, London,” Melody Maker, October 7, 1972.

  2. “I’m not going in the same direction as David”: Ray Fox-Cumming, “Lou Reed: The Black Sheep of New York.”

  3. “a backlash on Transformer”: Nick Kent, “A Walk on the Wild Side of Lou Reed,” New Musical Express, June 9, 1973.

  4. “some graffiti genius”: Ed McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall,” Rolling Stone, March 1, 1973.

  5. “Did you know that both shows are sold out?”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  6. “Those who expected the fey Phantom in pancake
”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  7. “Andy heard the news from the vultures”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  8. “His presence is cool and benign”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  9. “the kind of rock and roll that stands up to anything”: Richard Nusser, Village Voice, February 1, 1973.

  10. “This is the weirdest party I’ve ever seen”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  11. “somnambulant heart” and following: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  12. “In Fred’s mind”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  13. “Lou’s a changed man”: Nick Kent, “Lou Reed: The Sinatra of the Seventies,” New Musical Express, April 28, 1973.

  14. “to sag. His chin drops down on his chest”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  15. “I still do shoot it”: Lester Bangs, “Deaf-Mute in a Telephone Booth,” Let It Rock, November 1973.

  16. “It was like going to see God”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  17. “Let’s go… Get dressed” and following: Ed McCormack, “A Last Waltz on the Wild Side,” Vanity Fair, January 13, 2014.

  18. “That’s my masterpiece”: McCormack, “Scotch and Sympathy at Tully Hall.”

  19. “In the end… he kind of resented the song”: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  20. “Lou is out of the glitter thing”: Stephen Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin,” Circus, December 1973.

  21. “it was his favorite version that had ever been done on one of his songs”: Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin.”

  22. “I just found him blazingly smart and challenging”: Nick Patch, “Q and A: Bob Ezrin Discusses His Good Friend, Late Musician Lou Reed,” the Canadian Press, October 28, 2013.

  23. “do justice to his sledgehammer images” and following: Larry Sloman, “Lou Reed’s New Deco-Disk: Sledgehammer Blow to Glitterbugs,” Rolling Stone, September 27, 1973.

  24. “a top-notch set”: “Top Album Picks,” Billboard, October 13, 1973.

  25. “movie without pictures”: Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin.”

  26. “Berlin was real close to home”: David Fricke, “Lou Reed: Out of the Darkness,” Rolling Stone, September 25, 1986.

  27. “Lou had become abusive”: Bettye Kronstad, “Bettye Kronstad on Lou Reed’s Berlin,” cloudsandclocks.net, July 20, 2007, http://www.cloudsandclocks.net/features/kronstad_on_berlin_E.html.

  28. “might have had something to do with all the fucking drugs and drinking” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  29. “I remember the morning I woke up”: Kronstad, “Bettye Kronstad on Lou Reed’s Berlin.”

  30. “The other thing… is that he was actually writing” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  31. “I love the idea of a divided city”: Author interview, Lou Reed.

  32. “Berlin needed a lyrical approach that was direct”: Bruce Pollock, “Lou Reed Does Not Want Anyone to Know How He Writes His Songs,” Modern Hi-Fi and Music, 1975.

  33. “just magnificent, visceral, elemental writing”: Patch, “Q and A: Bob Ezrin Discusses His Good Friend, Late Musician Lou Reed.”

  34. “a nightmare to make” and following: Russell Hall, “Bob Ezrin,” Performing Songwriter, January/February 2002.

  35. “It drove me literally crazy”: Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin.”

  36. “I dropped fourteen minutes of endings, solos, interstitial material”: Sloman, “Lou Reed’s New Deco-Disk.”

  37. “told his seven-year-old son, David”: Rob Bowman, liner notes, Between Thought and Expression: The Lou Reed Anthology (RCA), 1992.

  38. “It was a heroin rebound”: Bowman, Between Thought and Expression.

  39. “Lou doesn’t want to talk about it much”: Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin.”

  40. “I think I’ve gone as deep as I want to go”: Pollock, “Lou Reed Does Not Want Anyone to Know How He Writes His Songs.”

  41. “I know why he called it Berlin”: Ron Ross, “The Head Doll Talks About Lou Reed’s Berlin,” Phonograph Record, December 1973.

  42. “Just when you think your ex-idol has slumped”: Nick Kent, review of Berlin, New Musical Express, October 6, 1973.

  43. “Lou Reed’s Berlin… is a disaster”: Stephen Davis, review of Berlin, Rolling Stone, December 20, 1973.

  44. “It’s one of the worst reviews I’ve ever seen of anything”: Pollock, “Lou Reed Does Not Want Anyone to Know How He Writes His Songs.”

  45. “Strikingly and unexpectedly, Lou Reed’s Berlin”: John Rockwell, “Pop: The Glitter Is Gold,” the New York Times, December 9, 1973.

  46. “the most affecting rock effort in recent memory”: Demorest, “Lou Reed Stuns Listeners with the Horrifying Story of Berlin.”

  47. “But I fail to see how that makes it a bad record”: Timothy Ferris, “The Beauty of Decay,” review of Rock n Roll Animal, Rolling Stone, March 28, 1974.

  48. “I don’t think anybody is anybody else’s moral compass”: David Marchese, “The Spin Interview: Lou Reed,” Spin, November 1, 2008.

  Chapter 9. Rock n Roll Animal

  1. “That was the bad move”: Author interview, Lou Reed.

  2. “The expectation was that I was going to do something very commercial with him”: Ben Sisario, “Revisiting a Bleak Album to Plumb Its Dark Riches,” the New York Times, December 13, 2006.

  3. “didn’t have a radio-friendly single”: Russell Hall, “Bob Ezrin,” Performing Songwriter, January/February 2002.

  4. “not for good reasons”: Author interview, Lou Reed.

  5. “I had heard of Lou because some of my friends” and following: Author interview, Eddie Reynolds.

  6. “I know why you’re all here”: Nick Kent, “Lou Reed: The Sinatra of the Seventies,” New Musical Express, April 28, 1973.

  7. “He ripped me a new one” and following: Author interview, Eddie Reynolds.

  8. “I don’t think I’m a singer”: Chris Charlesworth, “Lou Reed: Man of Few Words,” Melody Maker, March 9, 1974.

  9. “It’s just like Lou Reed”: Wayne Robins, “Lou Reed: Rock n Roll Animal,” Zoo World, April 25, 1974.

  10. “Reed’s live music brings the Velvets into the arena”: Robert Christgau, Consumer Guide review of Rock n Roll Animal, 1974, https://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=Lou+Reed.

  11. “mediocre pickup band”: Paul Nelson, review of Lou Reed Live, Rolling Stone, June 5, 1975.

  12. “It was the only thing to do at the time” and following: Lenny Kaye, “Lou Reed,” New Musical Express, January 24, 1976.

  13. “A lot of people, myself included”: Author interview, Lou Reed.

  14. “that macabre… ah, majestic”: Nick Kent, “A Limey in L.A. #1: Hey Man, You with a Gwoop?,” New Musical Express, March 15, 1975.

  15. “so incredible, the most incredible albums ever made”: Kaye, “Lou Reed.”

  16. “When I made my pitch at an A&R meeting”: Kevin Avery, Everything Is an Afterthought: The Life and Writings of Paul Nelson (Fantagraphics Books, 2011), p. 435.

  17. “Do you people have a curfew”: Lou Reed, spoken introduction to “I’m Waiting for the Man,” 1969: The Velvet Underground Live (Mercury, 1974).

  18. “couldn’t wait to hear them”: Avery, Everything Is an Afterthought, p. 435.

  19. “The Velvet Underground must have scared a lot of people”: Elliott Murphy, liner notes, 1969: The Velvet Underground Live (Mercury, 1974).

  20. “this very nice boy Lewis Reed called”: Avery, Everything Is an Afterthought, p. 435.

  21. “After the show, all these people came over” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  22. “While everyone e
lse was at the show”: Bettye Kronstad, “Bettye Kronstad on Lou Reed’s Berlin,” cloudsandclocks.net, July 20, 2007, http://www.cloudsandclocks.net/features/kronstad_on_berlin_E.html.

  23. “Then things calmed down” and following: Author interview, Bettye Kronstad.

  Chapter 10. One Machine Talking to Another

  1. “Steve left because he thought” and following: Author interview, Michael Fonfara.

  2. “This is fantastic: the worse I am, the more it sells”: Author interview, Danny Fields.

  3. “According to one of the spot’s producers”: Richard Metzger, “Amusing TV Commercial for Lou Reed’s Sleazy Sally Can’t Dance Album, 1974,” dangerousminds.net, February 25, 2014, http://dangerousminds.net/comments/amusing_tv_commercial_for_lou_reeds_sleazy_sally_cant_dance_album_1974.

  4. “Oh, I slept through Sally Can’t Dance”: Caroline Coon, “Lou Reed: How Lou Saw the White Light,” Melody Maker, December 18, 1976.

  5. “What a horror. It went Top 10 and it sucks”: Lenny Kaye, “Lou Reed,” New Musical Express, January 24, 1976.

  6. “The worse the albums were, the more they apparently sold”: Coon, “Lou Reed: How Lou Saw the White Light.”

  7. “I kept thinking that somehow it would stop”: Coon, “Lou Reed: How Lou Saw the White Light.”

  8. “My goal at the time”: Lou Reed, liner notes, Metal Machine Music: Performed by Zeitkratzer Live (Asphodel, 2007).

  9. “Warhol once said that his ambition was to become a machine”: Ken Emerson, “Why Can’t America Love New York City’s Pop Favorites?,” the New York Times, Arts and Leisure, September 28, 1975.

  10. “It’s just one machine talking to another”: Anthony O’Grady, “An Afternoon with Lou Reed and Metal Machine Music,” RAM, August 9, 1975.

  11. “pretentious”: Rob Bowman, liner notes, Between Thought and Expression: The Lou Reed Anthology (RCA).

  12. “I did tons of shows with the Velvet Underground”: David Fricke, liner notes, Metal Machine Music reissue (Buddha/RCA/BMG, 2000).

  13. “you start to hear a certain oblique cohesion”: Fricke, Metal Machine Music reissue.