Lou Reed

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.