A friend came through yesterday with passes for Lollapalooza and I was excited until I took a close look at the line-up. Perhaps its a sign of losing touch due to age (so many names I've never seen before), but of the 150 bands listed, I can find only one that I'm truly excited about seeing; my clown prince hero Lou Reed. For me there is no downside to seeing Lou. I like him as much when he's bad as when he's good. If he comes out and plays a stellar set including some Berlin era songs I'll be thrilled. If he comes out and reads from The Raven while his Tai Chi guys "interprets" on the side, I'll shake with laughter at his ridiculousness.
Today's post includes both good and good-bad Lou. I've included "Sad Song", one his greatest songs ever from his incredibly ambitious, depressing and claustrophobic 1972 Rock opera Berlin. On the other end of the spectrum is "Turn To Me" from 1984's New Sensations, a great example of an album of bad Lou gone good when he tries to go upbeat for a set. You may remember that this was from the era when he was doing TV scooter ads with Grace Jones. Two years later, he would release what I believe to be the worst record of all time by any artist, Mistrial , featuring Lou trying to rap on "The Original Wrapper". Hilarious stuff.
Sad Song
Turn To Me
2 comments:
Warning: The links are reversed, and "Turn To Me" is a truly execrable piece of music.
It took a song that bad to get a comment out you !
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