Lou Reed

One of the secrets behind the professional longevity of Lou Reed can also be traced back to the fact that, throughout his career, he was constantly on the move. Credit must be given to him for always having the ability, for better or worse, to shed his skin and reinvent himself, never looking back.

The black-and-white image portraying him, made up and adorned like a geisha, with the stunned expression of an effeminate Frankenstein, set against the silhouette of a guitar outlined in orange and green – captured for this album's cover by the great Mick Rock, “the man who photographed the Seventies” – is therefore nothing more than one facet, one of his many artistic personas. Let's take a step back, then, and try to pinpoint the reason behind this metamorphosis that turned him from an alternative artist into a glam icon.

In the summer of 1972, Lou Reed found himself in a paradoxical artistic situation. With the Velvet Underground – a band that would prove to be among the most influential and important in rock music – he had written and performed some of the finest and most groundbreaking songs of recent years, yet despite this he found himself at a dead end that had plunged him into the darkest uncertainty.

His first solo album, the folk-tinged "Lou Reed", despite some good songs, failed to live up to his previous work; perhaps also due to poor production, it was a resounding commercial flop; he is virtually unknown to the general public and his artistic career is on the brink of ruin.

At the same time, a new phenomenon is living through its brief but glorious season: glam rock, the "rock of glitter". Androgynous, polymorphous sexuality, a phantasmagoric and deliberately kitsch look, transgressive and decadent music.

The new generation doesn't recognize itself in the great ideals that characterized the huge pacifist gatherings, all "peace & love", of the youth movements of the Sixties. Compared to their naive older siblings, the psychedelic hippie "flower children", they have lost their innocence and their enthusiasm. They are vain, wicked kids, all "sex, drugs and rock'n'roll", and all they want is to have fun, in a spirit of disengagement and carefree abandon. They find the fulfillment of their desires embodied in glam: sex, ambiguity, excess; but also defiance of bourgeois conventions, rejection of dominant models, a taste for cross-dressing and a rethinking of masculine identity pushed to the most extreme limits. Glam performers strike theatrical poses like Thirties divas, wear make-up, jewelry, wigs, clothes covered in glitter and sequins. They brazenly declare their bisexuality, undermining at the root the very concept of identity and sexuality, steering the glam movement toward a process of "sexualization" unprecedented until then in the world of rock.

In England, the homeland of glam, artists such as Gary Glitter, Alice Cooper, Bryan Ferry of Roxy Music, Marc Bolan of T. Rex stand out, but at the height of success with the rock-sci-fi saga "The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars", in which he plays an alien, the androgynous "Ziggy Stardust" inspired by the lead character of Andy Warhol's theatrical piece "PORK", there is David Bowie. The future Thin White Duke has never hidden the fact that he was heavily influenced by the pronounced theatricality of the Velvet Underground and that he experimented with sounds originally explored precisely by them. He paid tribute to Lou Reed, both by dedicating to him one of the most exhilarating tracks on "Hunky Dory", "Queen Bitch", in which he deliberately imitates his voice, and by performing songs from the Velvet Underground's repertoire in concert. He therefore cannot accept that such great talent should go to waste, that the very man he considers one of his masters should end up forgotten. For these reasons, very generously, as rarely happens between artists, he offers to collaborate on the production of his next album, one more chance the Rca gives Lou Reed to redeem himself after the failure of his previous work.

Lou Reed certainly doesn't turn down such an opportunity and immediately moves to London, where he feels perfectly at home in the glam scene, so eccentric, effervescent, vital, intensely creative, all built on image and surface, the natural heir to Andy Warhol's Factory (his guru and first manager), where glam has its roots. After all, "camp" sensibility - in other words, the love of artifice and exaggeration - derives directly from Warhol's "pop" aesthetic. Reed greatly admires David Bowie's sophisticated, sexually ambiguous attitude, and is impressed by his storytelling gifts, his organizational skills, his shrewd and intelligent manipulation of the mass media as an integral part of an artistic event, so similar to Warhol's approach. Bowie, in turn, is in awe of Lou Reed, so much so that he would later state: "Lou accepted my collaboration as producer, he was so generous, I was stunned. I had so many ideas but I was intimidated by the work he had done. Even though there were only a few years between us, Lou had such a wealth of experience!". He invites him as guest of honor to one of his concerts at the Royal Festival Hall, and holds a press conference to publicize their music and their image. He wants to bring his audience closer to Lou Reed, but also to publicly acknowledge him as a source of inspiration deserving of attention, and declares: "Lou brought rock into the avant-garde. He created the environment in which to place our more theatrical vision. He gave us the road and the landscapes, and we populated them. Lou Reed created the verbal and musical Zeitgeist". Not only does he thus effectively mark Lou Reed's entry into glam rock, but, going well beyond mere production, he also contributes to the creation of what will become his glam, decadent and maudit persona, "the Phantom of rock": black bodysuit, Japanese make-up, kohl-lined eyes, black lacquered nails.

Bowie, whose greatness also lies in this, thus repays, with a gesture of love and gratitude, the debt he owes his idol, at that moment somewhat in decline; but the release of the album - whose telling title will be "Transformer", an explicit reference to cross-dressing with a clear glam stamp - will mark the end of their partnership.

On one side there is David Bowie, cultured, exotic, a dreamer, sensitive and irritable, strong but certainly not as tough as Reed. On the other there is the real Lou Reed, fast, nervous, charged with New York tension and vibrations, sarcastic, tough, aggressive. Acting as a bridge between these two extraordinary artists is the solid, trusty Mick Ronson, whom Bowie brings in for the production. A brilliant and powerful guitarist, king of distortion and the "searing" solo, a complete musician, creator of the spatial sound of "Ziggy Stardust", he proves crucial in providing an invaluable contribution to the making of "Transformer". If Bowie can be for Lou Reed a perfect collaborator, as Warhol was, offering suggestions, urging him on and encouraging him, Ronson can be a perfect substitute - albeit less innovative and experimental, let's say more commercial - for John Cale.

Lou Reed sings his songs, laying down the basic structure and melody, accompanying himself on guitar. Around his simple but effective harmonies, Ronson wraps sober, refined, captivating arrangements. Ronson, in fact, composes the string and horn arrangements and all the big piano parts which, together with his "nasal" guitar - played with the wah-wah pedal pressed halfway - give the album its immediately identifiable sound.

The line-up chosen is of the highest caliber: besides Lou Reed (acoustic guitar), David Bowie (backing vocals-mixing), Mick Ronson (guitars, piano, backing vocals), Herbie Flowers (bass, tuba, various instruments), there's also the famous Klaus Voormann, the celebrated bassist who worked with the Beatles and with John Lennon's Plastic Ono Band (bass, bass guitar), and Ronnie Ross (sax). A record that in its context sounds perfect also thanks to Lou Reed's surreal, confidential, lustful, caressing voice.

Underground, disturbing, big-city rock has wedded bittersweet, hedonistic glam, and the fruit of this union is a true gem, a string of precious pearls, small masterpieces that are still utterly relevant today, retaining over time an incredible freshness and the full force of their power, still intact.

"Writing songs is like acting and reserving the lead role for yourself, so you try to write the best lines you can. They're short parts and you have to adapt to play all the characters. I write through someone else's eyes, I always watch closely the people I'm about to write a song about, then I turn into them". "I've always thought it would be fun to introduce people to characters they had maybe never met before, or had never wanted to meet. The kind of people you sometimes see at parties, but never dare approach. That's one of the main reasons I wrote those songs".

Personal experience always surfaces in what one writes, but in these statements we can probably find the key to interpreting most of the lyrics on "Transformer", which have absolutely nothing to envy in the lyrics of Velvet Underground lore.

The imaginative lyrics of the first track, "Vicious", were suggested to him by Warhol, who asked him to write a song about being vicious, with a sadomasochistic sublimation whereby, instead of a whip, a flower is used to beat the lover: "Vicious/ you hit me with a flower/ You do it every hour/ oh baby, you're so vicious". A cheerful, playful rock tune, sung by Lou Reed in an ironically ambiguous way. The arrangement is deliberately spare, to highlight the distorted riff, simple but effective, of Ronson's nervy guitar.

"Andy's Chest", a track that was part of the Velvet Underground's "lost" album, released only in 1985, is a soft, tender, surreal love song dedicated to his friend Warhol, who in 1968 nearly died at the hands of a deranged woman who shot him point-blank in the chest. Slower than the version already recorded, it nonetheless retains a cheerful pace and is pleasantly enriched by the backing vocals.

What can be said of "Perfect Day" except that it's a "perfect song". The song everyone would love to have dedicated to them. A gorgeous ballad with a jazzy flavor, sweet and melancholy. Ronson's piano and string arrangements are enchanting. Reed's poetic and melodic artistry rises above everything, and it does so with such linearity, such simplicity and such poetry that it leaves us astonished. With an emotionally touching performance, in just a few lines it captures what a perfect day can be like, a way of escaping daily anxieties and nocturnal demons. Moving. "Just a perfect day/ you made me forget myself/ I thought I was someone else/ someone good", but also cautionary: "You're going to reap just what you sow". Boogie-rhythm piano and classic rock'n'roll guitar drive "Hangin' Around", poking fun at certain characters - probably people he'd recently met in London - who fancy themselves transgressive but are really just pathetic.

Jazzy atmosphere, syncopated rhythm, simple yet effective, underpinned by Herbie Flowers's famous bass line (achieved by doubling an upright bass with an electric bass), Lou Reed's acoustic guitar, and the knowing backing vocals of the "Thunder Thighs" for "Walk On The Wild Side", a stroll on the wild side. Warhol was supposed to adapt for the stage a Nelson Algren novel titled, fittingly, "Walk On The Wild Side", and he asked Reed to write some songs for it. The project fell through, but Reed picked up the theme again for this song, replacing the book's characters with the familiar figures who hung around the Factory, Warhol's collective workshop, a kind of court of miracles that housed people of every persuasion, all chasing their "fifteen minutes of fame" which, according to the Pop Art king's theory, could not be denied to anyone. Each verse sketches out a character, a flash that crystallizes a metaphorically representative moment in that person's life, or a provocative habit presented as natural in its own drama, which nonetheless shines through regardless. Upending conventional decency, bluntly and without shame, Reed lays bare the submerged world of a transgressive, sick, vicious and lost New York; he shows the dark side of things with absolute clarity and, as is his style, with no pretense of judging but rather prompting reflection, opening the mind, discovering that there are other worlds that don't match our own reality. Ronnie Ross's smooth sax spares us the embarrassment of having intruded into their private lives — scandalous, "wild" to us, but simply everyday life for them, lived serenely, naturally. "Walk On The Wild Side" was the first single from the album and also the first song to contain explicit references to cross-dressing "Holly came from Miami F.L.A./ hitch-hiked her way across the U.S.A./ Plucked her eyebrows on the way/ shaved her leg and then he was a she", to oral sex "But she never lost her head / even when she was givin' head", to male prostitution "Little Joe never once gave it away/ everybody had to pay and pay", and yet it was calmly played on the radio in non-English-speaking countries; even the BBC, not grasping the true meaning of certain slang phrases, broadcast it in full. Only in America did radio stations demand a sanitized version.

With "Make Up", a melodic, breezy track punctuated by Herbie Flowers's tuba, Lou Reed declares his sympathy for drag queens and gay men. Its chorus, in fact, carries the Gay Liberation Front slogan "Now, we're coming/ out of our closets/ Out on the streets".

"Satellite of Love" is one of the finest glam ballads ever written. In the chorus, Bowie's exceptional, extraordinary voice stands out, reaching soaring high notes. The harmonic base is more open, built largely on major-key chords, with piano as the lead instrument. The lyrics, wickedly ironic, mock the theme of jealousy: "I've been told that you've been bold/ with Harry, Mark and John Monday/ and Tuesday Wednesday through Thursday/ with Harry, Mark and John".

Around the rocking "Wagon Wheel" swirls an urban legend claiming it was actually written by David Bowie. The lyrics, pure Reed through and through, already reveal a certain unease within a relationship, a restlessness and impatience that likely mirrored his own private life. Perhaps it was the first step that would later lead him to take refuge in his own obsessions with "Berlin", a story of love, death and drugs.

Recorded live in the studio, "New York Telephone Conversation" has a rhythm straight out of vaudeville, with cabaret-style piano, bass and cymbals. In some verses Bowie doubles Reed an octave higher, lending the track a playful, frivolous tone. This song too is dedicated to Warhol, well known in his circle as an inveterate talker and a skilled gossip. It was common knowledge that he spent hours on the phone with friends and collaborators, talking about everything and, above all, recording everything; some of these recordings were used for the stage piece "Pork" and for the book "a". Energetic rock, with Bowie on backing vocals and Ronson delivering a gorgeous guitar solo, marks "I'm So Free", which captures a happy, carefree moment for the narrator. One curiosity: "Mother Nature" is slang for marijuana, and her children are those who smoke it.

The album closes with "Goodnight Ladies", featuring Herbie Flowers on tuba backed by his "friends", a typical little Dixieland band. Reed's performance is extraordinary and intense as he tells a tale of loneliness and abandonment: "Oh-wow-wow, something tells me that you're really gone you said we could be friends but that's not what I want Ah, anyway, my TV dinner's almost done it's a lonely Saturday night I mean to tell you, it's a lonely Saturday night".

"Transformer", released in November 1972 and followed by an extraordinary tour, was a massive success that topped charts everywhere, transforming Lou Reed from a cult underground figure into a rock star. It also proved pivotal to his career, not only or even mainly for its own intrinsic worth, but because it marked his artistic rebirth and restored the self-belief he had lost after the breakup of the Velvet Underground.

For its time it was a scandalous album, starting with the cover, which featured on the back a double image of the same model: once as a cross-dresser (scantily dressed and sexy), and once as a man with a banana ironically tucked into his trousers to simulate an erection. Pathetically, the Italian edition was censored with a gold band running horizontally across the cover, reading "Produced by David Bowie and Mick Ronson", covering both photos right at crotch level.

The impact the album's sexual content had at the time has since largely been forgotten, but it was a shocking record, revolutionary in its language, ahead of the shift in manners and morals to come, an outrageous glam manifesto in every respect, a testament to a way of living and seeing the world essential to understanding the Seventies. Today drag queens populate television talk shows and gay people live and assert their sexuality openly, but back then all of this belonged solely to a narrow artistic milieu.

Lou Reed's achievement was to sublimate vice, lifting it out of the judgment of conventional morality, bringing to light, "legitimizing" a submerged world that caused embarrassment and provoked scandal, portraying it in all its raw realism, telling it without euphemism and without self-satisfaction, with just the touch of poetry needed to make it fascinating and human. But the contrast between his private life and his public image was jarring. Lou Reed soon felt trapped in the role of "rock's phantom", a role he never fully identified with and which he probably used only as a means to finally bring his songs to a wider audience.

He would go on to shed his glam trappings, which for him remained only a brief parenthesis, distancing himself from them politely but firmly, and, in a complete break from continuity, would give us the undisputed masterpiece that is "Berlin", a tortured and poetic album, his artistic self-portrait, with which he pushed the boundaries of his own art even further.

Scenes come and go, new ones are created, but fortunately the music remains. "Transformer" is by now a classic, a memorable, unforgettable, timeless album. To this day it remains Lou Reed's best-known, best-selling work, proof, if any were still needed, that quality and commercial success can perfectly coexist.

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06/11/2006