Monday, April 23, 2007
Things I Like # 1: The Velvet Underground
The Velvet Underground
Forever and ever, The Velvet Underground. Art-rock kiddies, this is your bench mark. Listen to ‘Sister Ray’ or (my current fave rave) the bootleg instrumental mix of The Gift (unparalled dirge-funk, like a stoned Meters) and recognise you ain’t ever gonna beat this. (That’s a challenge. I know you can do it really!). This is The Gold Standard of dope fiend pop-art New York NOISE.
.1. The Velvet Underground & Nico
Phallic pop-art bananas! Germanic death-pop! Screeching Lamonte Young avant-garde viola insanity! What drugs sound like! The best debut LP of all time!
.2. White Light / White Heat
Not white at all! Black as hell! Like being crushed by a New York subway train! And loving it! Kill all hippies! The definitive anti-production production! Top 10 LP of all time!
.3. The Velvet Underground
The calm after the storm! Really quiet, muffled songs about Jesus and salvation and hope and all sortsa un-Velvety, but, like, TOTALLY VELEVTY stuff like that! Genuinely, heartbreakingly wonderful!
.4. Loaded
‘Cos, it’s like, LOADED with hits, yeah? Actual, ‘normal’ rock ‘n’ roll songs! Commercial, even! FM radio! Some stuff that sounds like Creedence Clearwayer Revival! Which is a good thing!
Currently reading: “All Yesterdays Parties: The VU in Print 1966-1971,” awesome collection of contemporary reviews, interviews, promotional material and wild theorising on The Velvets, including – Natch – The Man Who Based An Entire Journalistic School Around His Deathless Obession With The Velvet Underground – His Holy Saint Lester Of Bangs. Main attraction for my dollar is abundance of super-hip Warhol / Exploding Plastic Inevitable period stuff, the kinda stuff which all comes off like Tom Woolfe Sunday supplement-lite (a compliment), plus a v. cool song-ography at the back listing all sortsa super-obscurities like, ‘oh, yeah, you gotta hear the August 17th 1967 Max’s Kansas City version of Sister Ray, it’s 3 hours long yadda yadda yadda.’
An evening spent with the incredible, Ultimate Velvets Bible 5CD ‘Peel Slowly And See’ Boxset on your stereo and a copy of this (and maybe a copy of oral VU history ‘Uptight’) and you’ve got yourself a party, boy howdy! ¶ 2:40 PM
Forever and ever, The Velvet Underground. Art-rock kiddies, this is your bench mark. Listen to ‘Sister Ray’ or (my current fave rave) the bootleg instrumental mix of The Gift (unparalled dirge-funk, like a stoned Meters) and recognise you ain’t ever gonna beat this. (That’s a challenge. I know you can do it really!). This is The Gold Standard of dope fiend pop-art New York NOISE.
.1. The Velvet Underground & Nico
Phallic pop-art bananas! Germanic death-pop! Screeching Lamonte Young avant-garde viola insanity! What drugs sound like! The best debut LP of all time!
.2. White Light / White Heat
Not white at all! Black as hell! Like being crushed by a New York subway train! And loving it! Kill all hippies! The definitive anti-production production! Top 10 LP of all time!
.3. The Velvet Underground
The calm after the storm! Really quiet, muffled songs about Jesus and salvation and hope and all sortsa un-Velvety, but, like, TOTALLY VELEVTY stuff like that! Genuinely, heartbreakingly wonderful!
.4. Loaded
‘Cos, it’s like, LOADED with hits, yeah? Actual, ‘normal’ rock ‘n’ roll songs! Commercial, even! FM radio! Some stuff that sounds like Creedence Clearwayer Revival! Which is a good thing!
Currently reading: “All Yesterdays Parties: The VU in Print 1966-1971,” awesome collection of contemporary reviews, interviews, promotional material and wild theorising on The Velvets, including – Natch – The Man Who Based An Entire Journalistic School Around His Deathless Obession With The Velvet Underground – His Holy Saint Lester Of Bangs. Main attraction for my dollar is abundance of super-hip Warhol / Exploding Plastic Inevitable period stuff, the kinda stuff which all comes off like Tom Woolfe Sunday supplement-lite (a compliment), plus a v. cool song-ography at the back listing all sortsa super-obscurities like, ‘oh, yeah, you gotta hear the August 17th 1967 Max’s Kansas City version of Sister Ray, it’s 3 hours long yadda yadda yadda.’
An evening spent with the incredible, Ultimate Velvets Bible 5CD ‘Peel Slowly And See’ Boxset on your stereo and a copy of this (and maybe a copy of oral VU history ‘Uptight’) and you’ve got yourself a party, boy howdy! ¶ 2:40 PM
