I was not planning to write anything about Lou Reed, but 72 hours
later, I am still surprised at how visceral and emotional my reaction was upon
reading of his death (on twitter, of course, an hour or so after it was first
announced).
I am not even sure I would have put Lou Reed on my list of favourite
artists (The Stones, Geldof/The Boomtown Rats, Maria McKee and Billy Bragg are
charter members, with others floating in and out), even if two of his albums
(New York and Transformer, more on those below) are amongst my favourite and
are both brilliant. But here I was, in my Tralee hotel room on Sunday night,
stomach-punched by the news of his death. I then spent three hours listening to
youtube clips by and reading articles about him that were being posted to
twitter.
I have since then been trying to figure out why and I think it is
because I am currently re-discovering him.
I have been buying some of his work from the 70's and moving from being
a life-long casual fan to getting to know his work more in-depth. It started
with buying Transformer about 18 months ago, and being completely flabbergasted
at the strength and the imagery of every track. I also realised that the
Greatest Hits collection I owned must have included at least six tracks from
that album. Transformer has been on my playlist since.
Building on that, one of my favourite moments in London was finding
a copy of Metal Machine Music, the post-industrial ode to noise that he put out
post-Transformer.
A friend lent me New York in university around the time it first
came out (1988); I promptly bought it myself and listened to it over and over.
It is a perfect reflection of the times, with songs about the AIDS blight,
inner city decay, the results of eight year of Reagan, etc. Again, as for Transformer,
each song is brilliantly written, telling a self-contained story that builds
upon the album's themes, with lyrics that are often times caustic ('Give me
your hungry, your tired, your poor I'll piss on them/That's what the Statue of
Bigotry says') yet precise and to the point.
I have read interviews (see, in particular, Neil Gaiman's [and yes,
my geeky head almost explodes at the thought that Gaiman interviewed Reed])
where Reed describes his work as writing a novel. I tend to scoff at
songwriters who make such claims (Pete Townsend is a perfect example); they
generally come off as self-aggrandisement from ageing rock stars who feel the
need to justify their artistic output (i.e., pop ditties) by linking it to or
re-interpreting as a 'respected', more highbrow art form. In Reed's case,
however, I may see his point. Both Transformer and New York feel like chapters
in a book describing where the author stood at that particular time in his life
and, in both these cases, how he saw, understood and interacted with NYC.
Whether he crafted a novel, or simply a string of highly acclaimed
and influential albums, Lou Reed’s legacy will carry on, most probably as one
of the more regarded auteurs in his medium. Rest well, Mr. Reed, you have
deserved it.
