It’s been a sad day today as we all found out the news that Lou reed passed away. I thought I’d write a tribute to this great rock n’roll guy. Here goes…
I think I always respected Lou Reed for a couple of reasons. Firstly, his work ethic.
Back in the early days when he lived and worked at Andy Warhol’s studio in New York, Warhol used to task him with producing a song a day. It had to be written, rehearsed and then performed in the evening to the rest of Warhol’s ensemble.
This process was all part of that anti-art movement of the 60s (oddly enough shared by Eno and Bowie as well). Less artist as ‘gateway to the gods’ and more action. I liked that kind of honest, working man’s ethic.
Secondly, I loved Lou Reed’s work because, just like Bowie, he may have been into all this anti-art stuff, but that’s all because he was a bloody good artist in the first place. We all know the story about The Velvet Underground inspiring a million garage bands because of their ‘just do it’ attitude – but you’ve still got to have those great songs in order to inspire people to pick up a guitar.
Just listen to tracks like ‘Perfect Day‘, ‘Coney Island Baby‘ or even even the much later ‘Ecstasy‘ – great stuff.
I could also mention his never-ending ability to experiment – which resulted in this:
But I guess I’ll leave you with one of my favourite tracks. I still find this a tricky one to sing and play along to on guitar – how does he do it?
Thanks for all the great times Lou – we’re going to miss you!
Steven Wilson-Beales
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