"...and then my MIND split open!": The Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat POLL

Here She Comes Now.

"Lady Godiva's Operation"

Right, because something that's not "Sister Ray" has a chance of winning.

Voted WL/WH, but which there were an option for "Everything except "The Gift," the worst song ever recorded by VU and in fact a song so bad in conception that it sometimes makes me wonder whether I'm wrong about the great genius of the rest of their output."

Wow you really hate "The Gift".

xp You're RONG about the gift, but I'm torn between WLWH and I Heard Her Call My Name.

i don't hate The Gift but i agree that it is the only song not in contention. i am either going to go short or long on this one.

I like The Gift. I voted for I Heard Her Call My Name though.

For some reason the lyric "here she ever comes now" bugs me.

it's not 'if she ever comes now'?

what is is then g00blar?

This is tougher than I thought:

- "White Light/White Heat" is maybe my favorite album opener of all time. No foolin' around, no intro, it's almost like the needle landed somewhere in the middle of the record to start things off.

- Sucker for stereo tricks like "The Gift". It's why I can't completely dis on "Party For Your Right To Fight" by P.E. And I'd be lying if I said I hadn't tried the whole "I've got a tune but no lyrics, so I'm just going to read a nice little story over it."

- But yeah, in the end, I guess there's only one pick I can make.

xpost oh nevermind i'm sorry...voted Call My Name...

Nothing worth voting for, but I'd go for "Sister Ray" as the worst.

come on geir yo know you love here she comes now!!!

yo = you

On this one, there is really nothing. The other albums all have a "Sunday Morning"/"Candy Says"/"Here Comes The Sun", but this album didn't have any song like those.

"Who Loves The Sun", I mean

Here Comes the Hongro

I actually kind of adore 'The Gift' but WL/WH is a deserved classic.

it's not 'if she ever comes now'?

Here Comes The Hongrostepper

Voted for "Sister Ray," but "Here She Comes Now" might be the creepiest VU song of all.

this is album is muy perfecto, but today, i'm voting for the title track. still absolutely insane and absolutely awesome. not sure if anything else really sounds like this. FUZZ.

I liked The Gift until I sat down and actually listened to the words. It just so reeks of some show-off 15 year old trying to be "clever" in English composition class or something.

yeah that's exactly what it is! still funny, though.

greatest thing abt The Gift = Booker T.

Well, not according to most lyric sites.

Whaaa, really? I can't imagine anyone hearing that as anything other than "now, if she ever comes now, now, if she ever comes now, now, if she ever comes nooooooooooow", not "now, here she ever comes now, now, here she ever comes now, now, here she ever comes noooooooow".

You're right though, the first 4-5 google hits have it as "here she ever comes now". lyricstime manages to not screw up completely.

see, i was always confused by the whole "booker t./gift" thing. the song they called "booker t." on the Peel Slowly box set does not really sound like the "booker t." that is the backing track for "The Gift."

xpost, yeah i'd think it was "if she ever ..." i mean, that's what the song's about, right?

I went for "Lady Godiva's Operation", btw, if only for that moment where the heart beat comes in, the yawning sounds of death approach, then the sound crashes back in with "one goes here....one goes...there!", followed by "the ether tube's leaking, says someone who's sloppy".

Also because Cale+Tucker on that song are fucking unstoppable. That is THE groove of all times.

^on the money

yeah, the bass/drum interplay on that song is nuts. i've also always been in love with the weird, whirring percussion on "Here She Comes Now" -- what the hell is that?

but Call My Name is the one...everyone raves about Reed's free-jazz guitar but it's the call-and-response vocals which make that track.

But this whole album is wonderful. Easily on my top 10 of all time.

however I think it is Morrison playing bass on that track perhaps? bcz Cale is playing viola?? (he could be dong both I'm not sure)

"that track" = Godiva (sry, I'm jumping around)

I liked The Gift until I sat down and actually listened to the words. It just so reeks of some show-off 15 year old trying to be "clever" in English composition class or something.

Right, exactly! I've got no beef with the SOUND of "The Gift," but I truly believe it's a short story one of them published in their high-school literary magazine and then set to music, and if I were the editor of a high-school literary magazine (which I was, actually!) I would have turned it down. People should have the self-control to leave their juvenilia in the closet. (Though just to contradict myself, I think "Kings" is actually something Stephin Merritt wrote when he was a 15-year-old wannabe surrealist and it's one of my favorite things in the whole MF catalog.)

Oh, you're right about Morrison - he played bass on track, according to this

Major props to unstoppable Morrison+Tucker rhythm attack, then.

voted the gift

White Light/White Heat

shit, slipped and voted for the gift when i meant LGO!

dude, if Sterling played bass on The Gift then he & Mo made the first side of this album.

"I Heard Her Call My Name" - three reasons:

1) Reed's all-over-the-place demented vocals
2) "...and then my MIND split open!" especially for the SKRREEEEEE!!! feedback noise that immediately follows it
3) Tucker's drumming propelling the whole song BOOMBOOM BOOMBOOM BOOMBOOM BOOMBOOM

that'd be cale on bass on the gift, right?

could be...i don't know...that's cale reading the story, but the story and the music are recorded on the two separate tracks, so conceivably cale could have played bass live with the band and then (or prior to the recording) recorded the story...

i like cale's vocals too actually

Here She Comes Now, the record's most endearing pop moment, at least for me. Love the the sleepy gentleness, the dissipated yearning in Lou's voice on the chorus ohs, the woozy buildup through the verses. I guess everything I like about it exists in stronger form in Lady Godiva's Operation, which really oughtta win this, but I love the the offhanded vibe. Dunno what that that mechanical ticking/buzzing noise is. It's always reminded me of a clock, but it doesn't really sound like that at all.

Whole record's, great, even The Gift, which is funny because of its juvenile goofiness, not in spite of it. Have to admit that, these days, I'm much less often inclined to listen to Sister Ray all the way through than I once was.

i actually like sister ray a lot more than I used to...before it was the first three minutes and then ...zzzzzzzzzzz... but recently after playing it in a bar, I've come to realize just how fucked it reallyis. The noise is like venomous wraiths slowly wrapping around your brain...

also...it is great at the end of Brick.

The noise is like venomous wraiths slowly wrapping around your brain...

― insufferably annoying

OTM. Only it's like tense, uncomfortable wraiths with scabby forearms and gray teeth who won't stop talking about bugs in the microcircuitry. A feeling I'm only occasionally up for.

After hearing the renditions of "Sister Ray" from the Quine tapes and other live shows, the versioon on WLWH seems relatively tame. It's still great, obviously, but when I get to song 6 I tend to either switch to live stuff.

3 discs is relatively skimpy...you'd think they could've cobbled together some kind of mini-documentary with any/all existing footage, new interviews, etc.

Tracks 2 and 3 on disc 3 is a typo: Song is "I'm not a young man anymore"

DUH

Should come in a box with a little Waldo Jeffers.

― hopping and bopping to the krokodil rot (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, 2 October 2013 16:39 (4 hours ago) Permalink

YES

So I guess next year we'll get a s/t album box w/the rest of the VU/Another View/box set stuff and a sampler of the era's live tapes?

can't let a 45th anniversary slip by!

Seem to have come rather close to it though. Came rather close to only releasing it in time for 46th anniversary.

Looks like a nice release wonder what price is like? THink I was seeing something exorbitant being talked about elsewhere.

& what was the story on the mono only being a different mix on half of it and a fold down on the other half was that mentioned here or elsewhere.

elsewhere.

kind of an interesting tidbit from the velvet forum
"Guess I'm Falling in Love recording date is Sept 5th and not Dec 5th as informed before, so [it is] actually an outtake of the Wl/Wh recording sessions"
which seems kind of nuts to me considering the drum sound on the "guess I'm falling in love" on another VU

I was thinking that too, but "Guess" was mixed in the 80s for Another View; I don't think a mixdown existed prior. The drums being low in the mix on WL/WH could be more down to mixing than recording.

And if that's the case, I wouldn't be opposed to a full remix of WL/WH if it'll come out sounding like "Guess."

yeah, would be interesting/weird to hear the whole album mixed like "guess" on another vu. maybe for the 90th anniversary edition.

how the hell can the gift finish last here? i love it. lyrics & music. just about perfect. sister ray is rubbish, i have never understood it's appeal. it's so bloody repetitive and one-dimensional.

Why does everybody hate the story of "The Gift"? I think it's really cool! Sure, it could use a little editing here and there, but I love the idea. More songs should just be really long stories instead of singing.

sister ray is rubbish, i have never understood it's appeal. it's so bloody repetitive and one-dimensional.

I just don't understand people sometimes

The Gift? Well, when you've heard the story, you've heard it.

I was right, checked the Amazon.com pre-release price for this and it's just short of $100 for the 3cd with book Super Deluxe Edition. That's actually higher than the 6cd & Nico so I wonder if it is right.

What's on the non-Super Deluxe 2cd version? The Mono and the Stereo? Found the place where somebody was talking about only half of the lp being true mono, 1st 1/2 seems to have been recorded that way & 2nd 1/2 is apparently a fold down of the stereo version.
Subsequently wondering if they're going ahead and doing the 2cd that way or rearranging it further.

Would be nice to have a version of the Gymnasium in best possible sound even with having the circulated bootleg. But no way I could afford the € equivalent of that $100 for the set.

looks like the non deluxe 2cd version is discs 1 and 3 of the super deluxe. which maybeeee is all i want?

Yeah, me too. Particularly as I own a mono LP already, and :

9. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(VOCAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
10. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(INSTRUMENTAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)

.. is a fib: Take one stereo CD, etc.

i like 'the gift' but it definitely has less replay value than the rest of the album.

But if you listen enough you can even appreciate the musical qualities of Cale's narration - like the way the phrase "...finally submitting to the final caresses of sexual oblivion" syncs up perfectly to the beat.

ha, yeah, obviously once you know the end of the gift, the story itself might not be that interesting, but i like cale's speaking voice mixing it up with the backing track. don't think i need the "vocal" version, but the backing track by itself is fucking great.

It's on "Peel Slowly" innit?

the backing track? no, it's never been officially released afaik.

There's a live version of "The Booker T" ("The Gift" backing track) on the box.

ah.

"booker T" on the peel slowly box set is pretty much a different thing than "the gift" tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdBwxDBXQSk
vs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egFezSPH4D8

Will have to dig it out.

I have that New Zealand "What goes on" set also

In fact, what haven't I got?

I just found out that the UK Universal edition of the box comes with a free flexidisc of Booker T from the Gymnasium for the initial batch of orders from the website
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/the-velvet-underground-to-reissue-white-light-white-heat-20131001#ixzz2gV5XHFqJ

I thought it was already on the Gymnasium disc supposedly. & on the Peel Slowly & See box.

I thought the track was an improvisation on a theme so open to pretty wide difference gig to gig and it has always been put forward as the track that The Gift was read to. Don't remember having read or seen anything about the story recitation being played live, as I've come across being talked about elsewhere since this box set was announced. Which may be triggered by the tracklisting that's been announced.

They certainly played it live at the gig I was at!

Yeah, they did it on the '93 tour. It's funny, on the live album you can hear the cheers as they build up to the climax of the story.

I was thinking more of the original Cale era. Was Murder Mystery done live in the Yule era?
Both strike me as studio experiments. Very wordy to remember during a gig.

I love this album too much to participate in this thread.

they did bits of the murder mystery at the end of various sister rays in the yule era.
iirc cale read the gift off of a sheet of paper at the 93 gigs.

Yeah was thinking that it must have been read off something.

But also that something done by the reunion band after the track had had several decades to sink in with the audience wasn't necessarily the way that it would have been presented originally.

& both Booker T and The Gift instrumental appear to be approaching something based on the same groove/riff whatever from different focuses.

But one's a fairly boring 12-bar and the other's an awesome one chord choogle

(... well it's not one chord, but no changes nonetheless)

iirc cale read the gift off of a sheet of paper at the 93 gigs.

― tylerw, Sunday, October 6, 2013 10:15 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, he did. I remember from Ira Kaplan's adorably gushing review of their Paris show in Spin something like, "A music stand is being brought out. 'The Gift'? Yep, called it!"

Looks like they're also putting out a 2-disc Deluxe Edition of WL/WH that surprisingly doesn't include the mono version of the album but does include the Gymnasiuim concert!

Disc: 1
1. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (STEREO VERSION)
2. THE GIFT (STEREO VERSION)
3. LADY GODIVA'S OPERATION (STEREO VERSION)
4. HERE SHE COMES NOW (STEREO VERSION)
5. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (STEREO VERSION)
6. SISTER RAY (STEREO VERSION)
7. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (STEREO VERSION)(ALTERNATE TAKE)
8. GUESS I'M FALLING IN LOVE (STEREO VERSION)(INSTRUMENTAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
9. TEMPTATION INSIDE YOUR HEART (STEREO VERSION)(ORIGINAL MIX)
10. STEPHANIE SAYS (STEREO VERSION)(ORIGINAL MIX)
11. HEY MR. RAIN (STEREO VERSION)(VERSION ONE)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
12. HEY MR. RAIN (STEREO VERSION) (VERSION TWO)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
13. BEGINNING TO SEE THE LIGHT (STEREO VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED EARLY VERSION)

Disc: 2
1. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (MONO VERSION)
2. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)
3. LADY GODIVA'S OPERATION (MONO VERSION)
4. HERE SHE COMES NOW (MONO VERSION)
5. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (MONO VERSION)
6. SISTER RAY (MONO VERSION)
7. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (MONO VERSION)(MONO SINGLE MIX)
8. HERE SHE COMES NOW (MONO VERSION)(MONO SINGLE MIX)
9. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(VOCAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
10. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(INSTRUMENTAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)

Disc: 3
1. BOOKER T. (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
2. I'M NOT A YOUNG MAN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
3. ANYMORE (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
4. GUESS I'M FALLING IN LOVE (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
5. I'M WAITING FOR THE MAN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
6. RUN RUN RUN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
7. SISTER RAY (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
8. THE GIFT (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)

That was supposed to look like this:

Disc: 1
1. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (STEREO VERSION)
2. THE GIFT (STEREO VERSION)
3. LADY GODIVA'S OPERATION (STEREO VERSION)
4. HERE SHE COMES NOW (STEREO VERSION)
5. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (STEREO VERSION)
6. SISTER RAY (STEREO VERSION)
7. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (STEREO VERSION)(ALTERNATE TAKE)
8. GUESS I'M FALLING IN LOVE (STEREO VERSION)(INSTRUMENTAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
9. TEMPTATION INSIDE YOUR HEART (STEREO VERSION)(ORIGINAL MIX)
10. STEPHANIE SAYS (STEREO VERSION)(ORIGINAL MIX)
11. HEY MR. RAIN (STEREO VERSION)(VERSION ONE)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
12. HEY MR. RAIN (STEREO VERSION) (VERSION TWO)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
13. BEGINNING TO SEE THE LIGHT (STEREO VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED EARLY VERSION)

Disc: 2
1. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (MONO VERSION)
2. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)
3. LADY GODIVA'S OPERATION (MONO VERSION)
4. HERE SHE COMES NOW (MONO VERSION)
5. I HEARD HER CALL MY NAME (MONO VERSION)
6. SISTER RAY (MONO VERSION)
7. WHITE LIGHT/WHITE HEAT (MONO VERSION)(MONO SINGLE MIX)
8. HERE SHE COMES NOW (MONO VERSION)(MONO SINGLE MIX)
9. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(VOCAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
10. THE GIFT (MONO VERSION)(INSTRUMENTAL VERSION)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)

Disc: 3 2
1. BOOKER T. (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
2. I'M NOT A YOUNG MAN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
3. ANYMORE (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
4. GUESS I'M FALLING IN LOVE (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)
5. I'M WAITING FOR THE MAN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
6. RUN RUN RUN (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
7. SISTER RAY (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)
8. THE GIFT (LIVE AT THE GYMNASIUM, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 30, 1967)(PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED)

I went for "Lady Godiva's Operation", btw, if only for that moment where the heart beat comes in, the yawning sounds of death approach, then the sound crashes back in with "one goes here....one goes...there!", followed by "the ether tube's leaking, says someone who's sloppy".

― Z S, Wednesday, December 17, 2008 10:31 AM (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Also because Cale+Tucker on that song are fucking unstoppable. That is THE groove of all times.

― Z S, Wednesday, December 17, 2008 10:34 AM (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^on the money

― insufferably annoying (Drugs A. Money), Wednesday, December 17, 2008 10:35 AM (4 years ago) Bookmark

i cannot stop listening to and thinking about (and playing! so easy!) this song!! there is something wrong with me.
i have been humming and whistling it around school for days. in addition to the relentless groove, props to lady godiva herself, peeping tom, and all related legends.

30 sec teaser of that unreleased/unbootlegged "beginning to see the light" here:
http://cdnapi.kaltura.com/index.php/extwidget/openGraph/wid/0_klogtddq

and here's the whole of that "beginning": http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/velvet-underground-raid-the-vaults-for-light-premiere-20131205

love that picture:

http://assets-s3.rollingstone.com/assets/images/story/velvet-underground-raid-the-vaults-for-light-premiere-20131205/1000x600/120313-velvet-underground-600-1386099215.jpg

haha yeah... high concept photo shoot! "here is the band ... with their record!"
the outtake "beginning" is very cool, tho it sounds like Lou hadn't quite written the lyrics in full yet.

ahhh, the live "gift" on the new reish (which wasn't on the gymnasium bootleg), is soooooo good. just an instrumental, but a nasty, feedbacky ride. i love it.

not sure how they're getting away w/ calling the "heard her call my name" an "alternate take" though. definitely a different mix (basically like the sundazed single) but definitely the same take.

dudes aren't quite hitting the harmonies on the "original mix" of "Stephanie Says" though... nice to hear anyway.