Velvet Underground Trainspotting Question

Okay, now I want to hear this thing, not for the demos of known songs so much as several I'd never heard of, even from bootleg mavens:
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2022/sep/08/laurie-anderson-on-lou-reeds-lost-demo-tape-he-really-wasnt-that-interested-in-his-past Good comments from Anderson, hope she'll say more about it/him in this regard.

lmao rush

Lou Reed :: Transformer | Transformedhttps://t.co/QMe8Ym9VFD

To celebrate a 1/2 century of Transformer, here’s an alt version of the album, cobbled together from live performances, NYC apartment demos and internet sessions, stretching from the early 1970s to the 21st century. pic.twitter.com/Zzzi3GRbR5

— aquarium drunkard (@aquadrunkard) September 6, 2022

Has anybody run down where exactly the stuff on the Todd Haynes soundtrack comes from? Picked up a vinyl copy today & there aren't explanations for what the source is for the Theater of Eternal Music excerpt (or anything else).

https://www.criterion.com/films/33386-the-velvet-underground

No 4K?!? If ever a doco needed it, it’s this one.

The original master is 4K so maybe someday.

A lot of the archival stuff used was in 16mm so it should still look pretty great in HD. Past that, any added resolution is more about improving the film grain as all the captured detail is already there.

Actually, I completely forgot they stacked a lot of those films on top of each other, so yeah, 4K would have DEFINITELY been better!

exactly

"Words & Music, May 1965" releases today

Thanks. I guess that I just didn't know that until you told me.

Ah I see what you did there..

ok, sorry.

(the lyrical reference to "Heroin" icydk)

I didn’t know. I saw bits and pieces of it coming out but had no idea whether and when the whole thing was out

Is the Todd Haynes doc available for streaming or DVD? An Amazon search turned up no physical media it seems.

Apple TV for streaming, and there is a Criterion bluray/DVD coming in … November?

a previously-unknown song from "squeeze"

http://velvetforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=146101

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0U9VVPqhLY

saw the doc when it came out last year and finally rewatched last night. the bit when "Venus in Furs" comes in, like 45min into the film... god, what an incredible, breathtaking moment haynes sets up. all the thousands & thousands of times i've listened to those songs in innumerable different versions and permutations over so many years, i never thought i'd recapture the feeling of hearing the velvets for the first time again, but it truly comes across in that moment. that first note hits and my heart stops and i'm right back to that first time listening to the banana album as a kid. the electric shock of the new combined with that dreamlike feeling of familiarity, like "that's IT, THAT'S the sound I've been straining to hear but couldnt quite imagine!" what a blessing to be able to access that feeling again.

^good post!

yes

I kinda wanna get the Criterion version but our screen isn't big enough to really do it justice

That says everything I wanted to say about it. Made the familiar music fresh and strange all over.

geez, i have to see this. i'm so bad at watching music docs :/

That moment was so great in part because there were about fifty minutes of buildup before it happened.

Although before that they play a snatch of it over the titles near the beginning.

It’s like a magic trick - they show it to you, then convince you it doesn’t exist, then bring it back

Yes.

They give you a bit of isolated “Heroin” viola solo at the very beginning too.

Really also amazing to hear old friends and girlfriends speaking- Allan, Richard, Shelley - and Delmore, proud and regal.

https://recordmecca.com/products-page/museum-quality-collectibles/sterling-morrison-velvet-underground-ultra-rare-absolutely-cd-with-hudson-valley-philharmonic-orchestra-1-of-10/

wow

O_O

more trainspotting: https://www.ebay.com/itm/374503734097

This is a series of 5 minute Public Service Announcements, disguised as radio shows in the 1960's. They were sent out to radio stations. The format was usually the same. It would begin with the artist or member of the group being featured doing an intro for VISTA (Volunteers In Service To America). Then a story about the program and finally, a song from the featured artists. Each album usually contained 6 segments and were youth oriented, as they were trying to recruit young people.

Now, the Voices Of Vista LP we are offering are shows #76 A, B & C and #77 A, B & C. Featured are Lenny Welch (singing The Right To Cry), Gary Lewis (singing Ice Melts In The Sun), Simon & Garfunkel (singing At The Zoo), The Critters (singing Marryin' Kind Of Love), Tommy Roe (singing Sing Along With Me) AND The Intimates (singing ???-it sounds like it would be called Summer Fun).

If you search for Voices Of Vista shows 76 & 77, you'll find a show with Leon Bibb and Pic Temple.

The show we have doesn't seem to exist and is presumed UNRELEASED!

NOW it gets interesting!

Lou Reed, in his pre-Velvet Underground days was in a group called The Intimates. They released one single on Epic.

The song on this LP is NOT either side of that single.

SO, you may say that it must be ANOTHER group with the same name.

BUT, at the beginning of their segment was the introduction. "Hi. This is Bob Motta for Vista". Bob Motta WAS in Lou Reed's Intimates!

SO, could we have an UNRELEASED early Lou Reed track surfacing?

they're asking $999.99, lol

R.A. Lafferty is laughing all the way to his Ktistec Machine.

Both of those things seem like they’re priced pretty cheap, considering people pay hundreds of $ for a minty OG Dark Side or whatever

agreed

Recommend that VU trainspotters clock in to Andrew Hickey’s epic podcast “A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs” wherein the latest episode tells the story of the VU in a way I’ve never heard it told before.

And for real trainspotters, Ugly Things issue #60 has a very in-depth look at Lou’s Pickwick years and how it led directly, implausibly, to the formation of the VU. And when you’ve read that article, supplement it with the 2-part Ugly Things podcast interview with the article’s author — lots of song clips and fun connective tissue, so well worth it.

didn't Cale work at Pickwick with Reed? iirc that's how they met?

I thought the story was that, after Reed had recorded and released "The Ostrich" (as the Primitives) either Reed himself or someone at Pickwick hired Cale, Tony Conrad and Walter De Maria to play some gigs as the Primitives? I'm not sure if Reed knew Cale before that though.

According to the Anthony DeCurtis bio, Terry Phillips, Reed’s cowriter was asked to form a band as The Primitives were asked to appear on a TV show.

As Tom D said, these were Tony Conrad, Walter De Maria and Cale. Phillips thought Cale was a pop musician because of his long hair and his accent was close enough to cash in on the British Invasion at the time.

No idea of Conrad and De Maria’s hair styles.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C8RKIqGUAAARZwq?format=jpg

Shoe polish obviously in short supply in NYC in 1965.

Also, with this being the de facto rolling VU thread, I missed this excellent bit of esoterica.

From Hickey:

Cale and Conrad … had been invited to a party on the Lower East Side, and there they’d been introduced to Terry Phillips of Pickwick Records. Phillips had seen their long hair and asked if they were musicians, so they’d answered “yes”. He asked if they were in a band, and they said yes. He asked if that band had a drummer, and again they said yes.

By this point they realised that he had assumed they were rock guitarists, rather than experimental avant-garde string players, but they decided to play along and see where this was going. Phillips told them that if they brought along their drummer to Pickwick’s studios the next day, he had a job for them.

The two of them went along with Walter de Maria, who did play the drums a little in between his conceptual art work, and there they were played a record:

[Excerpt: The Primitives, “The Ostrich”]

It was explained to them that Pickwick made knock-off records — soundalikes of big hits, and their own records in the style of those hits, all played by a bunch of session musicians and put out under different band names. This one, by “the Primitives”, they thought had a shot at being an actual hit, even though it was a dance-craze song about a dance where one partner lays on the floor and the other stamps on their head. But if it was going to be a hit, they needed an actual band to go out and perform it, backing the singer. How would Cale, Conrad, and de Maria like to be three quarters of the Primitives?

It sounded fun, but of course they weren’t actually guitarists. But as it turned out, that wasn’t going to be a problem. They were told that the guitars on the track had all been tuned to one note — not even to an open chord, like we talked about Steve Cropper doing last episode, but all the strings to one note.

Cale and Conrad were astonished — that was exactly the kind of thing they’d been doing in their drone experiments with La Monte Young. Who was this person who was independently inventing the most advanced ideas in experimental music but applying them to pop songs?

And that was how they met Lou Reed

There's not actually anything new in that account, to be honest, but LOL at Pickwick thinking "The Ostrich" could be a hit. Also it doesn't actually sound like the guitars are all tuned to one note. It's a good story though.

Maybe one guitar was and somebody embellished, which is maybe what you mean.

A dance where someone stomps on someone else’s head seems a very VU thing to do.