Rock, Metal

The Velvet Underground - Scepter Studios Sessions (2012)

2012-11-28T17:27:44Z

Velvet Underground - Scepter Studios Sessions (2012)


01 – European Son
02 – The Black Angel’s Death Song
03 – All Tomorrow’s Parties
04 – I’ll be Your Mirror
05 – Heroin
06 – Femme Fatale
07 – Venus in Furs
08 – Waiting For the Man
09 – Run Run Run

Personnel:
    John Cale – electric viola, piano, celesta on "Sunday Morning", bass guitar, backing vocals
    Sterling Morrison – guitar, bass guitar, backing vocals
    Nico – chanteuse, lead vocals on "Femme Fatale", "All Tomorrow's Parties" and "I'll Be Your Mirror"
    Lou Reed – vocals, guitar and ostrich guitar
    Maureen Tucker – percussion

Norman Dolph's original acetate recording of the Scepter Studios material contains several recordings that would make it onto the final album, though many are different mixes of those recordings and three are different takes entirely. The acetate was cut on April 25, 1966, shortly after the recording sessions. It would resurface decades later when it was bought by collector Warren Hill of Montreal, Canada in September 2002 at a flea market in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City for $0.75. Hill put the album up for auction on eBay in November. On December 8, 2006, a winning bid for $155,401 was placed, but not honored. The album was again placed for auction on eBay and was successfully sold on December 16, 2006 for $25,200.

Although ten songs were recorded during the Scepter sessions, only nine appear on the acetate cut. Dolph recalls "There She Goes Again" being the missing song (and, indeed, the version of "There She Goes Again" that appears on the final LP is attributed to the Scepter Studios session).

Though rumors have circulated concerning an eventual official release of this version of the album, this has yet to be confirmed or announced by any major record label. However, a ripped version of the acetate began circulating the internet in January 2007. Bootleg versions of the acetate tracks have also become available on vinyl and CD.

In 2012, the acetate was officially released as disc 4 of the omnicomprehensive "45th Anniversary Super Deluxe Edition" box set of the album. The disc also includes six previously unreleased bonus tracks, recorded during the band's rehearsals at The Factory on January 3, 1966.

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Velvet Underground - Loaded (1970)

2010-06-05T23:05:49Z

Velvet Underground - Loaded (1970)


01. Who Loves The Sun – 2:45
02. Sweet Jane – 4:04
03. Rock & Roll – 4:42
04. Cool It Down – 3:01
05. New Age – 5:01
06. Head Held High – 2:55
07. Lonesome Cowboy Bill – 2:42
08. I Found A Reason – 4:14
09. Train Round The Bend – 3:18
10. Oh! Sweet Nuthin' – 7:24

Personnel:
- Lou Reed - vocals, guitar, piano
- Doug Yule - vocals, acoustic & electric guitars, piano, organ, bass, drums
- Maureen Moe Tucker - drums
- Sterling Morrison – gitar

After The Velvet Underground cut three albums for the jazz-oriented Verve label that earned them lots of notoriety but negligible sales, the group signed with industry powerhouse Atlantic Records in 1970; label head Ahmet Ertegun supposedly asked Lou Reed to avoid sex and drugs in his songs, and instead focus on making an album "loaded with hits." Loaded was the result, and with appropriate irony it turned out to be the first VU album that made any noticeable impact on commercial radio -- and also their swan song, with Reed leaving the group shortly before its release. With John Cale long gone from the band, Doug Yule highly prominent (he sings lead on four of the ten tracks), and Maureen Tucker absent on maternity leave, this is hardly a purist's Velvet Underground album. But while Lou Reed always wrote great rock & roll songs with killer hooks, on Loaded his tunes were at last given a polished but intelligent production that made them sound like the hits they should have been, and there's no arguing that "Sweet Jane" and "Rock and Roll" are as joyously anthemic as anything he's ever recorded. And if this release generally maintains a tight focus on the sunny side of the VU's personality (or would that be Reed's personality?), "New Age" and "Oh! Sweet Nuthin'" prove he had hardly abandoned his contemplative side, and "Train Around the Bend" is a subtle but revealing metaphor for his weariness with the music business. Sterling Morrison once said of Loaded, "It showed that we could have, all along, made truly commercial sounding records," but just as importantly, it proved they could do so without entirely abandoning their musical personality in the process. It's a pity that notion hadn't occurred to anyone a few years earlier. --- Mark Deming, allmusic.com

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Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967)

2010-06-05T22:34:38Z

Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967)


01. Sunday Morning (Reed, Cale) – 2:54
02. I'm Waiting For The Man – 4:44
03. Femme Fatale – 2:36
04. Venus In Furs – 5:10
05. Run Run Run – 4:22
06. All Tomorrow's Parties – 5:56
07. Heroin – 7:12
08. There She Goes Again – 2:38
09. I'll Be Your Mirror – 2:11
10. The Black Angel's Death Song (Cale, Reed) – 3:11
11. European Son (Cale, Reed, Morrison, Tucker) – 7:54
Bonuses:
12. All Tomorrow's Parties (Single Version) - 2:49
13. I'll Be Your Mirror (Single Version) - 2:16
14. Sunday Morning (Single Version) - 2:55
15. Femme Fatale (Single Version) - 2:36

Personnel:
- Lou Reed – vocals, lead and ostrich guitar
- John Cale – electric viola, piano, celesta on "Sunday Morning", bass guitar, backing vocals
- Sterling Morrison – rhythm guitar, bass guitar, backing vocals
- Maureen Tucker – percussion
- Nico – chanteuse, lead vocals on "Femme Fatale", "All Tomorrow's Parties" and "I'll Be Your Mirror"; 
backing vocals on "Sunday Morning"

One would be hard-pressed to name a rock album whose influence has been as broad and pervasive as The Velvet Underground & Nico. While it reportedly took over a decade for the album's sales to crack six figures, glam, punk, new wave, goth, noise, and nearly every other left-of-center rock movement owes an audible debt to this set. While The Velvet Underground had as distinctive a sound as any band, what's most surprising about this album is its diversity. Here, the Velvets dipped their toes into dreamy pop ("Sunday Morning"), tough garage rock ("Waiting for the Man"), stripped-down R&B ("There She Goes Again"), and understated love songs ("I'll Be Your Mirror") when they weren't busy creating sounds without pop precedent. Lou Reed's lyrical exploration of drugs and kinky sex (then risky stuff in film and literature, let alone "teen music") always received the most press attention, but the music Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, and Maureen Tucker played was as radical as the words they accompanied. The bracing discord of "European Son," the troubling beauty of "All Tomorrow's Parties," and the expressive dynamics of "Heroin" all remain as compelling as the day they were recorded. While the significance of Nico's contributions have been debated over the years, she meshes with the band's outlook in that she hardly sounds like a typical rock vocalist, and if Andy Warhol's presence as producer was primarily a matter of signing the checks, his notoriety allowed The Velvet Underground to record their material without compromise, which would have been impossible under most other circumstances. Few rock albums are as important as The Velvet Underground & Nico, and fewer still have lost so little of their power to surprise and intrigue more than 40 years after first hitting the racks. ---Mark Deming, allmusic.com

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Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground (1969)

2010-06-06T12:51:49Z

Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground (1969)


01. Candy Says – 4:01
02. What Goes On – 4:51
03. Some Kinda Love – 4:00
04. Pale Blue Eyes – 5:37
05. Jesus – 3:21
06. Beginning To See The Light – 4:37
07. I'm Set Free – 4:00
08. That's The Story Of My Life – 1:56
09. The Murder Mystery – 8:51
10. After Hours – 2:06

Personnel:
- Lou Reed - lead vocals, guitar, backing vocals
- Sterling Morrison - vocals, guitar, co-vocal on The Murder Mystery
- Doug Yule - bass, organ, lead vocals on Candy Says, co-vocal on The Murder Mystery,
backing vocals
- Maureen Tucker - percussion, lead vocals on After Hours, co-vocal on The Murder Mystery, 
backing vocals

Upon first release, the Velvet Underground's self-titled third album must have surprised their fans nearly as much as their first two albums shocked the few mainstream music fans who heard them. After testing the limits of how musically and thematically challenging rock could be on Velvet Underground & Nico and White Light/White Heat, this 1969 release sounded spare, quiet, and contemplative, as if the previous albums documented some manic, speed-fueled party and this was the subdued morning after. (The album's relative calm has often been attributed to the departure of the band's most committed avant-gardist, John Cale, in the fall of 1968; the arrival of new bassist Doug Yule; and the theft of the band's amplifiers shortly before they began recording.) But Lou Reed's lyrical exploration of the demimonde is as keen here as on any album he ever made, while displaying a warmth and compassion he sometimes denied his characters. "Candy Says," "Pale Blue Eyes," and "I'm Set Free" may be more muted in approach than what the band had done in the past, but "What Goes On" and "Beginning to See the Light" made it clear the VU still loved rock & roll, and "The Murder Mystery" (which mixes and matches four separate poetic narratives) is as brave and uncompromising as anything on White Light/White Heat. This album sounds less like the Velvet Underground than any of their studio albums, but it's as personal, honest, and moving as anything Lou Reed ever committed to tape. ---Mark Deming, allmusic.com

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Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat (1968)

2010-06-06T23:22:28Z

Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat (1968)


01. White Light/White Heat (Reed) – 2:44
02. The Gift (Reed, Morrison, Cale, Tucker) – 8:13
03. Lady Godiva's Operation (Reed) – 4:51
04. Here She Comes Now (Reed, Morrison, Cale) – 1:56
05. I Heard Her Call My Name (Reed) – 4:35
06. Sister Ray (Reed, Morrison, Cale, Tucker) – 17:25

Personnel:
- Lou Reed - vocals, guitar, piano
- John Cale - vocals, electric viola, organ, bass
- Sterling Morrison - vocals, guitar, bass
- Maureen Tucker - percussion, drums

The world of pop music was hardly ready for The Velvet Underground's first album when it appeared in the spring of 1967, but while The Velvet Underground and Nico sounded like an open challenge to conventional notions of what rock music could sound like (or what it could discuss), 1968's White Light/White Heat was a no-holds-barred frontal assault on cultural and aesthetic propriety. Recorded without the input of either Nico or Andy Warhol, White Light/White Heat was the purest and rawest document of the key Velvets lineup of Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison, and Maureen Tucker, capturing the group at their toughest and most abrasive. The album opens with an open and enthusiastic endorsement of amphetamines (startling even from this group of noted drug enthusiasts), and side one continues with an amusing shaggy-dog story set to a slab of lurching mutant R&B ("The Gift"), a perverse variation on an old folktale ("Lady Godiva's Operation"), and the album's sole "pretty" song, the mildly disquieting "Here She Comes Now." While side one was a good bit darker in tone than the Velvets' first album, side two was where they truly threw down the gauntlet with the manic, free-jazz implosion of "I Heard Her Call My Name" (featuring Reed's guitar work at its most gloriously fractured), and the epic noise jam "Sister Ray," 17 minutes of sex, drugs, violence, and other non-wholesome fun with the loudest rock group in the history of Western Civilization as the house band. White Light/White Heat is easily the least accessible of The Velvet Underground's studio albums, but anyone wanting to hear their guitar-mauling tribal frenzy straight with no chaser will love it, and those benighted souls who think of the Velvets as some sort of folk-rock band are advised to crank their stereo up to ten and give side two a spin. ---Mark Deming, allmusic.com

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